In 1925, an outgoing and strong-willed young man enrolled in Lincoln University, Pennsylvania. Tenacious, skillful, and persuasive, the young man quickly became the University's star debater. After graduating cum laude with distinction, he enrolled in Howard University Law School, where he graduated at the top of his class in 1933. Yet at the time, no one could have predicted that in 1967, Thurgood Marshall would become the first African-American Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court.
Justice Marshall's commitment to education began as a young lawyer fighting the State of Maryland for equal pay for black school teachers who were receiving the same salary as janitors. Throughout his career Thurgood Marshall worked within the legal system to make his vision of equal access to education a reality through precedent-setting court cases. In Brown vs. Board of Education the United States Supreme Court struck down the "Separate but Equal" doctrine, thus ending legalized segregation of educational institutions.
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