The Accomplished Life of Thurgood Marshall

By | August 20, 2021

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Even Marshall's exalted status as a civil rights leader understates his importance and impact. (history)

The slow disassembling of America’s racism owes a great deal of gratitude to one man, not Martin Luther King Jr., but Thurgood Marshall. The lawyer, activist, and eventual Supreme Court Judge helped turn the tide for civil rights as much as any human being in American history. Brown v. Board of Education headlines an endless list of legal battles Marshall successfully waged.

The breadth and scale of his impact simply beggars belief. Furthermore, as a black man born in 1908, Marshal literally risked his life for the cause but also walked the straight and narrow to absolute perfection. If he had ever so much as stepped a toe out of line, you can be assured some racist politicians with closets full of skeletons would have pulled him down, purely on account of his race.

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Marshall made just as big of an impact outside the court as in it. (baltimoremagazine)

Raised A Lawyer

Many of Thurgood Marshall’s strengths and virtues reflect his rigorous upbringing. Even his real name, Thoroughgood Marshall, spoke of a generosity spirit that portended the rest of his life. However, as even he admitted, it was a mouthful. “By the time I reached the second grade, I got tired of spelling all that out and had shortened it to Thurgood.”

His father, who worked at a country club, pushed Marshal into a life of law without ever vocalizing it. Young Thurgood often debated legal discussions with his dad and spent many a dinner defending his every statement at the dinner table. As Marshall put it, “He never told me to be a lawyer, but he turned me into one.” His parents wanted more for their children and made it an expectation. “It was taken for granted that we had to make something of ourselves. Not much was said about it; it was just in the atmosphere of the home,” said Marshall.