Columnist Jamala Rogers
July 2 would have been Thurgood Marshall’s 100th birthday. Justice Marshall’s rise to the U.S. Supreme Court as the first African American is known by most of us. However, Justice Marshall’s legacy is powerful and, given the current state of the courts on all levels, it should be a refresher for all those wanting to go into law. Justice Marshall was a humanitarian as well as a strategist and legal scholar.
When I look at attorneys now, it seems that far too many of them are into resume-building – not through their legal prowess but through social and political networking. Justice Marshall illuminated a path of service for others to follow even if you don’t have aspirations to be a U.S. Supreme Court Justice.
Marshall’s birth name was Thoroughgood, but he changed it in second grade to Thurgood. By his own admission, Marshall was a “cutup” while growing up. His punishment was to read the U.S. Constitution; he had memorized every word of it by the time he graduated from high school. His silly antics continued in college, and he was put out of college twice. Marshall settled down after he met and married his first wife, Vivian Burey. He graduated cum laude and went on to Howard Law School, where Dean Charles Houston challenged Marshall to even greater legal heights.
There are three qualities of Justice Marshall that I find most admirable and inspiring. One is that he was actually involved in fighting for civil and human rights through the NAACP. Therefore, he understood not just the legal implications of an issue but its social and political impact. He was working for change both inside and outside the courtroom.
Two, he didn’t let the “law of the land” restrict his fight boundaries. You often hear lawyers, prosecuting attorneys, attorney generals and the like talk about the law as if it is some sacred and unchangeable edict. They will uphold it even if it’s wrong and unfair. For example, Marshall argued the landmark St. Louis case of Shelley vs. Kraemer which went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. Restrictive covenants were laws used to keep blacks from owning property. If we had maintained all of this country’s racist laws, we can only imagine where black folks would be in 2008.
The third quality I admire about Justice Marshall is his tenacity. There were few barriers that could stop him from moving forward in his pursuit of justice. The best example of Marshall’s unrelenting obstinance is hanging on until a Democratic president could name his replacement to the High Court. Appointed by President Lyndon Johnson in 1965, Marshall would witness conservative appointments to the bench over the years, making his voice of justice and reason a minority. Marshall suffered heart attacks, pneumonia, glaucoma, blood clots and other health problems and was finally forced to retire in 1991. He continued to criticize the Supreme Court until his death two years later.
Although Thurgood Marshall is best known for Brown vs. Board of Education that ended school segregation, his cases covered an array of issues such as the death penalty, the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II, the rights of defendants (including a case that led to the adoption of the Miranda rights), housing and public accommodations.
One of the tasks facing the next U.S. president is making appointments to the U.S. Supreme Court. Judicial ideologues have disregarded their vow to fight for “equal justice for all,” words inscribed above the entrance to the Supreme Court. From municipal courts to the U.S. Supreme Court, judges make decisions that not only affect individual lives but affect the core values that protect our humanity and the conditions that support it. Always remember this when you go to vote.