Thurgood Marshall, attorney for the NAACP

When he ascended to the bench of the US Supreme Court, Thurgood Marshall had won 29 of the 32 cases he had argued in that chamber. Most of those cases involved civil rights as Marshall directed legal operations for the NAACP from 1940 to 1961.

In 1954, he convinced the Court that 'separate but equal' public school classrooms were unconstitutional (Brown v. Board of Education).

In other cases, Marshall defended the rights of the individual and affirmed legal protections for women, children, prisoners and homeless persons. He said the Constitution was the best weapon against Jim Crow laws and the equal protections clause was not complicated.

"Equal means getting the same thing at the same time and in the same place," he wrote.

He served on the Court for 24 years, retired in 1991 and died two years later.

MEDIUM : 1 negative : film.

CREATED/PUBLISHED: 1957 Sep. 17.

CREATOR: O'Halloran, Thomas J., photographer.

The image is part of the U.S. News & World Report magazine collection, which is housed in the Prints and Photographs Division of the Library of Congress.

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