"Well, we might as well get right down to it." "I have given 50 years to the law." "I've seen a lot and I've gotten too old to keep secrets." "Here at Howard University, we were taught one simple idea." "The law is a weapon if you know how to use it." "I was here during the Depression, class of 1933." "I see you've got this fancy auditorium here now." "Yeah, even got these nice upholstered seats." "(AUDIENCE CHUCKLING)" "Well, we had an old three-story brownstone with no heat." "Nobody knew what air conditioning was back then." "I would take the train over from Baltimore every morning, arrive at Union Station." "Some days I'd walk past the United States Capitol on my way to class." "They call Baltimore, "Up South"." "That's just below what we used to call the Smith  Wesson line." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "Baltimore is where slaves ran to, when they escaped from plantations in the Deep South." "Which may have something to do with why I was born there." "Now, my uncle Fearless, used to tell me about my great-grandfather who was called Thorney Good." "Seems, as a boy, he was a tracker for a big-game hunter in the toughest part of the Congo." "And this big-game hunter brought my great-grandfather to eastern Maryland as a slave." "He hated being a slave now." "Thorney Good became so hard to handle." "The big-game hunter got fed up." "He said, "Look, I brought you over here myself..." ""So I don't guess I can shoot you like you deserve." ""You so ornery to white people." "I can't sell you, can't give you away." ""So, I'm going to set you free," ""provided you get the hell off this eastern shore and never come back"." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "And you know, that was the only time that the big-game hunter didn't get an argument from Thorney Good." "But, he came back years later." "He bought land right next door." "So he could torment the big-game hunter for the rest of his life." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING AND APPLAUDING)" "My grandfather's name was Thoroughgood Marshall." "He had a grocery store on the corner of Dolphin and Division." "Grandma Annie Marshall was the lady of the store." "One day the electric company decides to put a power pole right out in front the store." "Well, when the workmen come with a court order," "Annie Marshall takes an old cane-backed kitchen chair out on the sidewalk, plunks herself right down on the spot." "She sat there for 4 days and 4 nights, 'till she got her way." "They say Grandma Annie's was the first successful sit-down strike in the history of Maryland." "My mother's father's name was Isaiah Olive Branch Williams." "When he came back from the Merchant Marine and, you know, started a family..." "Avon and Avonia, a boy and a girl named after Shakespeare's river," "Denmedia Marketa, for the family store, my mother, Norma, for Bellini's opera, (CHUCKLES) and my uncle, Fearless, for the way he glared at his daddy right after he was born." "Oh, you see, as a boy, I came to understand that two things marked my family, distinctive names and extreme stubbornness." "My parents named me after my grandfather, Thoroughgood." "T/H/O/R/O/U/G/H/G/O/O/D." "Well, by second grade, I got tired of writing out all those letters." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "I cut it to Thurgood." "I was born in 1908, the year that William Howard Taft was elected president." "Also the year that Jack Johnson knocked out Tommy Burns." " (BOXING BELL RINGS)" " Oh, yeah." "A negro was the Heavyweight Champion of the World." "You know what happened the very next day?" "Well, they went right out looking for the "great white hope" to take back the title." "Yeah." "There were race riots in Springfield, Illinois." "The home of Abraham Lincoln." "89 negroes were lynched that year." "And that's when they started the N-A-A-C-P." "The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People." "How many of you have heard of Homer Adolph Plessy?" "Anyone?" "Any..." "Oh, very good." "Yes, yes, very good, very good." "All right now, for those of you that don't know." "After the Civil War," "Homer Plessy and negroes in the South were free to vote, sit wherever they damn well pleased." "And then in 1890, Louisiana passed a law that ordered all rail companies to provide separate accommodations for white people and for colored people." "Do you know what they called it?" ""An act to promote the comfort of passengers". (SCOFFS)" "Now Homer Plessy decided to challenge this law by, taking a seat in a whites-only coach just outside New Orleans." "He refused to move to the colored car." "They arrested him, hauled him down to Criminal District Court." "Homer Plessy said that this segregation law violated his rights under the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution." "Now Judge John H. Ferguson didn't see it that way." "He fined him, $25." "Homer Plessy refused to pay the $25 fine." "He and his lawyer took it all the way to the Supreme Court of the United States." "The case was called..." "AUDIENCE:" "Plessy v. Ferguson." "Plessy v. Ferguson." "Very good, very good, ladies and gentlemen." "Now the Supreme Court ruled 7-to-1 against Mr. Plessy." "I want you to listen here to what the Justices wrote." ""The Fourteenth Amendment could not have been intended to enforce social equality." ""The feelings of inferiority that come from being segregated" ""exists only because the colored race" ""chooses to put that construction on it"." "Now, what did that mean?" "It meant that it was now legal for any state to pass Jim Crow laws that forced negroes to accept "separate but equal" facilities." "You see, when I was growing up in Baltimore, we had to use separate park benches, uh, separate drinking fountains, separate public toilets." "Now if you want to understand my story, don't forget that name, Homer Adolph Plessy." "(TRAIN WHISTLE BLOWS)" "My daddy was a Pullman car waiter on The BO Railroad." "He had blond hair and blue eyes and..." "Sometimes people mistook him for a white man." "He was the most insidious of my family of rebels." "He taught me how to argue and debate." "He challenged my logic on every point, even when we were discussing the weather." "Now he didn't have much schooling." "He was angry, and he was a drinker." "But somehow, he became interested in the law." "His hobby was to go downtown and sit in the back of the courthouse." "Some days he would carry me with him." "And when we came home, he would knock back a few shots of whiskey... and test me on the cases at the dinner table." "We would have the most violent arguments you ever heard." "Now, the man has his own way of making his points." "He'd say things like, um," ""Oh, that's mighty black of you"." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "Or, uh, he'd say, "Must be a white man in the wood pile"." "Now one day he sat me down." "He said, "Thurgood, anybody ever calls you nigger," ""you have business with them right then and there." ""You either win or lose right then and there"." "I got an afterschool job working for Mr. Schoen, a Jewish gentleman, who ran a fancy dress shop over on Charles Street." "One afternoon, he sent me to deliver a big pile of hats during the rush hour." "So I go to get on the trolley, a woman pushes past me, and then I feel a hand grab the back of my collar." "And this white man pulls me off the trolley." ""Sir, I'm just trying to get on the damned car"." "He says, "Nigger, don't you push in front of white people!"" "So quite naturally, I start swinging." "Well, the man smacked me to the ground, trampled all over the hats." "A policeman came over, hauled me down to the station." "So, now I have to call Mr. Schoen." "He comes over to the jail." "I'm crying by this time." "I'm apologizing for the damage to the hats." "He says, uh, "Did that man really call you nigger?"" "See yes, sir, he sure did." ""Thurgood, never mind the damn hats, you did the right thing"." "(SCHOOL BELL RINGS)" "You ever hear of Colored High?" "Colored High?" "Well, that's all right, that's where I went." "Yeah, same place my mother went to school." "I had this habit of always saying whatever was on my mind and so I would end up in arguments." "And one day, my teacher says, in front of the whole class," ""Thurgood, you are disputatious!"" "Then she hands me a copy of the Constitution of the United States, sends me down to the furnace room to memorize some part of it." "This was her special punishment for me." "I was sent to the furnace room so often, by my senior year I knew the whole thing by heart." "(MEN GRUNTING)" "From our second story classroom window," "I could look right down on the Northwest Baltimore Police Station." "I'd watch the negro prisoners being brought in by the white policemen." ""Black boy, why don't you shut your goddamned mouth"." ""Nigger, you're going to talk yourself right into the electric chair!"" "(FAINT SCREAMING)" "To this day, I can't get it out of my mind, the sound of cops beating the hell out of those prisoners." "Well, anyway, my mother was dead set on me getting a college education, so I had to earn some money." "My uncle Fearless got me a job as a dining car waiter on the BO." "They gave me this uniform." "The pants was about six inches too short." "Well, I go to the steward to see if I could get a longer pair, you know." "He says," ""Don't you know it's easier for me to find a shorter nigger" ""than to find a longer pair of pants?" "Why don't you scrooch down in them?"" "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "So, you know, I scrooched down in 'em." "See?" "And I became a pretty good waiter." "I bet I'm the only one here who can bone a trout on a moving train without putting any in the customer's lap." "(BELLS CHIMING)" "Well, I arrived at Lincoln College with a comic book in my back pocket and a highly cultivated interest in the female gender." "(BELL CHIMING CONTINUES)" "I was pinned to seven co-eds, all at the same time." "Yeah, I'd already decided that I was going to become a dentist." "And I was never going to lift anything heavier than a poker chip." "And then one day, we went into town to see a movie and... after we bought our tickets, they told us we had to go around the back, up the stairs, sit in the, uh... colored balcony, the Crow's Nest." "I'll tell you something, if enforcement hadn't been such a problem they would've made up a rule that said, "White folks get to laugh first"." "Anyway, we asked for our quarters back, they refused." "We got angry, tore down a bunch of curtains, broke a door, ran like hell." "We were, kind of, pleased with ourselves, but that night I could not sleep." "I lay there in bed thinking now, am I gonna go through life being humiliated... because of the color of my skin?" "One of the boys was named Langston Hughes." "Yes, Langston Hughes." "Oh, he was already writing poetry." "Lincoln was an all-negro college with all white professors." "Langston." "He was a fighter." "He'd organized the campaign to get Lincoln to hire some negro professors." "I went to him the next day." "I said, "I want to work with you"." "We got our first negro professor the very next year and I learned something from Langston..." "One person can make a difference." "He got me committed." "I put away the comic books." "I stopped playing pinochle, started studying history, joined the debate team." "(WH ISTLING)" "And then, I met the most beautiful and smart... and sensitive, 17-year-old co-ed you ever saw." "Everyone called her "Buster"." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "I told Buster she could wear my pin, and Buster informed me that I was going to marry her." "And that's exactly what I did." "Anyway, by this time, I knew that I wanted to go to law school, so..." "I got out my white jacket." "Went to earn some money at the Gibson Island Club, where my daddy was the head waiter." "(PIANO MUSIC PLAYS)" "One day, a United States Senator, a very crude individual comes into the club with a bevy of beautiful women, sits down under a portrait of some great Confederate General." "He spots me." "He says, "Hey, nigger"." "Now, I don't like him calling me that, not one bit." "But, I go over." "He says, "Nigger, I want service at this table"." "I give him the service, and he keeps calling me that and I'm liking it less and less." "But when he gets up, he leaves $20 on the table." "Now this crude fella keeps coming into the club, keeps leaving me these $20 tips." "Those twenties added up." "But one night my daddy hears the Senator shout," ""Hey nigger!" "Nigger this, nigger that"." "Sees me running over to take good care of him." "Well, you know my daddy's blue eyes were on fire." "He said "Thurgood!"" ""You're fired!" "You are a disgrace to colored people!"" "Well..." "After daddy had calmed down, I was able to explain, you know, what was going on." "Now, just between you and me, anytime you want to call me "Nigger", you just lay your $20 on the table." "You can keep doing it all day long." "But, the second you run out of them twenties," "I'm gonna have to have business with you, right then and there." "(BELL DINGING)" "The University of Maryland Law School was just a 10-minute trolley ride from our house." "And even though we paid our taxes in Maryland, they would not accept my application." "And the Plessy decision meant they didn't have to." "I told mama, "One day I am going to get even"." "(LAUGHTER)" "Now, the only other choice was right here at Howard University." "And, uh, do you know what they called Howard in those days?" "The "Dummy's Retreat"." "Now I hadn't earned enough money, you know, waiting tables, and um," "I didn't find this out until many years later." "My mother took the bus downtown, pawned her engagement ring and her wedding band so that I could come here." "Charles Hamilton Houston took over the law school at Howard the year that I arrived here." "Charlie Houston was smart as a whip, handsome as a movie star." "He had been an officer in the army in World War I." "And he was the first negro editor of the Harvard Law Review." "Charlie Houston stormed into class that first day, wearing his Phi Beta Kappa key." "Slammed the door behind him!" "(DOOR SLAMS)" ""Take a look at the man on your right." ""Now take a look at the man on your left." ""Understand this." "Two of you won't be here next year." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" ""I am here to make Howard the West Point of negro leadership." ""Think about this..." "There are 160,000 white lawyers in America." ""There are less than 1,000 negro lawyers, and we are going to change that." ""I want you to learn what your rights are under the Constitution," ""regardless of how they've been interpreted by the courts," ""and use the law to obtain justice." ""When you go into a courtroom, you cannot say..." ""Please, Mr. Court, have mercy on me because I am a negro"." ""You will be in competition with a highly-trained white lawyer, and..." ""if you expect to win, you'd better be better than he is." ""Now if I give you five cases to read overnight, you read eight." ""If I say eight, you better make it ten." ""You go that step further, you just might make it"." "(DOOR SLAMS)" "No one had ever challenged me that way before." "And now, here was a great human being, saying, "Shape up or ship out"." "Well, I was not going to ship out." "Some days, I would take the trolley across town to the Supreme Court Building, stand on those steps." "Read those words carved in stone." ""Equal Justice Under Law"." "I'd go inside." "I'd stand in the back of the chamber, and I'd listen to the great lawyers, like John W. Davis..." "The one they called the "lawyer's lawyer"." "He would speak in those smooth Southern tones." "Get all nine Justices right in the palm of his hand." "(HEROIC MUSIC PLAYS)" "I tell you, I could stand there and I could feel in my bones the power and the majesty of the law." "(CAR ENGINE RUNNING)" "In the summer of 1933, Charlie Houston asked me to drive down South with him in his beat-up old jalopy to study school conditions, me sitting in the backseat, typewriter on my lap, taking notes." "It's 100 degrees out." "We're not allowed to eat in restaurants now." "We pack our lunch." "One day, I'm sitting under a tree... and this little boy comes over and he's hungry." "So I offer him half my sandwich." "But he keeps staring at this really beautiful orange, which on this hot afternoon I'm really looking forward to." "I hand him the beautiful orange." "The next thing you know the little boy is biting through the rind, he's smashing the orange in his face." ""Stop that!" "What do you think you're doing?" "Stop that!"" "Well now, the little boy is frightened, he's crying." "Charlie comes running like we've been attacked by The Klan." ""I'm sorry, Charlie." "I was looking forward to that orange all afternoon and"..." ""Look around you, Thurgood!" ""You see that sharecropper shack?" ""You see that doghouse school?" "Look!" "Dirt floors." ""No windows." "Do you see any electricity?" ""This little boy has never seen an orange before." ""You're embarrassing yourself, and you're embarrassing me"." "(TYPEWRITER CLICKING)" "Phew." "That night, I wrote to my parents." ""Dear Mom and Dad, I still have so much to learn." ""Professor Houston says a lawyer who is not a social engineer" ""is a social parasite." ""And this is God's truth"." "See Charlie started talking about different ways to take on segregated schools." "There were two ways." "One way was to go directly into the courts, challenge it head on, arguing that segregation is unconstitutional." "The other was to use the Plessy decision, separate but equal, to insist that the states provide truly equal schools for negro students." "We call that Jim Crow Deluxe." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "So how do you start?" "Charlie decided that we would start with university graduate schools." "Find someone who wasn't afraid to stick his neck out, wouldn't be intimidated." "I found a fellow." "His name was Donald Gaines Murray." "He was an honor graduate from Amherst College." "And he agreed to apply to the University of Maryland Law School." "Oh, yeah." "I had a score to settle with those bastards." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" ""Dear Mr. Murray, President Pearson instructed me to return your application" ""and your $2 money order." ""The University of Maryland does not accept negro students." ""We maintain the Princess Anne Academy as a separate institution" ""for the education of negroes"." "Now this was "Exhibit A"." "We sue the university, charging that by refusing Mr. Murray's application, they had violated his rights under the Fourteenth Amendment." "So, one Monday morning, Charlie Houston," "Donald Gaines Murray and I, all show up in Baltimore City Court, wearing double-breasted suits with handkerchiefs in our breast pockets." "President Pearson started out by telling the court that there was an exceptional facility available for the study of law to Mr. Murray, right down the road at Howard University." "Well, the dean of Howard Law and his prize pupil were fixin' to show his ass just how right he was." "(AU DIENCE LAUGHING)" "(AUDIENCE APPLAUDING)" "President Pearson, it is true, is it not, the University of Maryland does not admit negroes?" "You say the Princess Anne Academy offers the same caliber of education and that the faculty is comparable." "Isn't it true, Princess Anne has only one faculty member who holds a master's degree?" "And the dean uses the title, "Doctor," but the title is "honorary?"" "Isn't it true, the University of Maryland has prominent Baltimore judges teaching the laws of Maryland?" "Then, if Mr. Murray wishes to practice law in Maryland, how can any law school be equal to the University of Maryland?" "Would you admit Mexicans, Japanese, and Filipinos to your university?" "You would?" "Then why, President Pearson, are members of Mr. Murray's race not admitted?" "I see, because state policy decrees it." "No further questions." "Your Honor, the University of Maryland cites Plessy v. Ferguson and the doctrine of separate but equal to justify its segregation policy." "But in this case, we have not challenged their right to have separate schools." "Rather, we have proven that Maryland's separate school system is not equal." "The Plessy decision is the law of the land." "The law requires that Mr. Murray be given an equal education." "(CHURCH BELL CHIMES)" "(HEROIC MUSIC PLAYS)" "At 5:00, on June 25, 1935, we were ordered back into the courtroom." "Judge Eugene O'Dunne hammers his gavel and orders the University of Maryland to admit Donald Gaines Murray to its law school." "(GAVEL BANGS)" "You see like Charlie Houston said, the law is a weapon." "Now I know this was just one little, tiny crack in the great wall that stood between the negro and the Promised Land." "But, that didn't stop me and Charlie Houston from booting up a few." "Oh, we closed quite a few saloons that night." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "Oh, yes, we did." "Oh, I forgot to tell you." "My mother was a schoolteacher, a very fine schoolteacher." "And, you know, it used to make me so goddamn mad when I would think that my mother, unlike white teachers, was required to scrub the floors of her classroom every night." "And do you know what she was paid?" "She was paid 40% less than white teachers." "So, we decided to take it to court." "Now this was my first case on my own." "I was nervous." "Uh, they didn't see negro lawyers in court in those days." "And when I invoked the Fourteenth Amendment, this hard-assed judge looked down on me and said," ""Lawyer, do you have a copy with you?"" "No, Your Honor, but I can tell you what it says." ""All persons born or naturalized in the United States" ""and subject to the jurisdiction thereof," ""are citizens of the United States" ""and of the state wherein they reside." ""No state shall make or enforce any law," ""which shall abridge the privileges" ""or immunities of citizens of the United States." ""Nor shall any state deprive any person" ""of life, liberty, or property," ""without due process of law" ""nor deny to any person" ""the equal protection of the laws"." "And, do you know what the judge said?" "God's truth." ""Lawyer, as long as I've been on the bench," ""I didn't know the Fourteenth Amendment applied to negroes"." "A few trips to the furnace room might have made him a better judge." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING AND APPLAUDING)" "So, the court ruled that the difference in salary... was discrimination on account of race." "And the state of Maryland knew it would cost them a bundle... to fight it out in every county." "So, they passed a law... granting equal pay to negro teachers, including my mother, Mrs. Norma Marshall." "(AUDIENCE APPLAUDING)" "(JAZZ MUSIC PLAYING)" "New York City." "Oh, Charlie Houston offered me $200 a month to come work with him at the legal department of the NAACP." "I grabbed it." "Buster and I moved up to New York." "Found ourselves a nice little apartment in Harlem." "You know our offices weren't very fancy." "You had to walk around the winos to get through the front door." "But, Charlie Houston had a plan now." "He said that real political power in the South would never come until the negro had a vote that counted." "That meant something." "Now, there were a million negroes in Texas." "If we could get a million negroes with votes... that counted, oh, we were going to have some fun." "So, Charlie sent me down South." "What I found down there were all sorts of schemes that had one purpose, to keep negroes from voting." "Things like poll taxes, "literacy" tests, physical intimidation." "You know I had arrived in Louisiana... the day after a sheriff shot and killed a negro just for registering to vote." "In T exas, negroes were allowed to vote in the, uh, general election, but that meant nothing because T exas was a democratic state." "Whoever won the Democratic primary automatically won the general election." "And negroes were not allowed to vote in the Democratic primary." "See that really fired me up!" "Oh, let's welcome these fine people here." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "Let's give them a warm welcome." "(AUDIENCE APPLAUDING)" "Welcome darlings, welcome, welcome." "Make yourselves comfortable." "These people will be going down to the furnace room later, ladies and gentlemen." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "So where were we?" "Oh, yes, negroes were not allowed to vote in the Democratic primary." "And because negroes were not allowed to vote in the Democratic primary, we really got fired up and we decided to take it to court." "Now do you know what the Democratic Party leaders in Texas said?" "They said that their party was a private club." "Yeah, and they were free to select the membership of the club." "And the T exas courts agreed with them." "But, one year later, just one year later, the Supreme Court of the United States agreed to hear our appeal in the case." "The case was called Smith vs. Allwright." "I called Buster the morning the decision came down, April 3, 1944." "Eight-to-one, honey, for us!" "That's right." "Now, you know, Buster." "She just burst into tears." "Now listen to what the Justices wrote." ""It is unconstitutional..." ""for a political party to limit its voters to white people..." ""because it endorses and enforces..." ""discrimination against negroes"." "You know what happened next?" "The negroes got dressed up in their Sunday best... just to register to vote." "It was a hundred degrees out!" "They were standing in a long line." "A white couple attempted to push past them." "A negro woman holding a parasol turned to them and said," ""You seem to be in a hurry." ""Well, you just go right on ahead." ""We've been waiting a long time." "We don't mind waiting a little bit longer"." "You see, I knew that our victory in the voting case was the beginning of real progress, real progress, mind you." "Because, let's face it, without the ballot a man is not a citizen." "But, you know, I also knew something else." "The ballot doesn't mean much without a first-class education." "Now, you know, people used to say that the reason that white people didn't want to open up the schoolhouse door is 'cause it leads straight to the bedroom door." "Now, do I need to tell you that that other door has been open for a mighty long time?" "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "Back in Baltimore, I used to watch kids playing ball in the streets together." "They'd separate to go to school." "They'd come out of school." "They'd play ball in the streets together." "It made me wonder, well, why do they have to be separated at school?" "See I came to believe that children sitting alongside one another learning in the same classroom, that was the best hope for our country." "That's when I decided to go down to Clarendon County, South Carolina." "(TRAIN WHISTLE BLOWS)" "I'm gonna tell you the cold truth now." "Every time I got on a train headed down South, I didn't know if I was coming back." "They didn't have a welcome mat for Negro lawyers." "I would take the Capitol Limited from New York down here to D.C." "I'd change to a "colored car" for the rest of the trip." "And in Southern cities and towns" "I would ride in the back of streetcars, and be just as quiet as a mouse." "I would eat in colored cafes." "You know they had me sleeping in a different house every night." "And I would always try to get the bedroom that was farthest from the window." "'Cause I never wanted anyone to know and, I mean, anyone." "Sometimes I'd lay in bed at night sweating, wondering if I was ever going to see Buster or New York again." "I could just, you know, picture my dead body laid out somewhere." "I'll tell you a story." "One time we were defending two negroes on a murder charge in a race riot in Columbia, Tennessee, right near the birthplace of The Ku Klux Klan." "Now, the word was out that if we even tried to sleep in that town, they'd kill us." "So, we drive 45 miles every night to Nashville." "So, one night, we're leaving town just after sunset." "I spot, oh, three, four state police cars." "They pull us over." "They say they have a warrant to search us." "I'm at the wheel." "The sheriff says, "Okay, boys, check out the trunk"." "I tell my people, say, "Don't let them plant something on us"." "Well, it was a dry county." "And lawyers, everybody knows lawyers are gonna drink." "But, believe it or not, we didn't have any whiskey in the car." "The sheriff says, "Search this nigger lawyer"." "I say, "You have a warrant to search me?"" "He says, "No"." "I say, "Then, the answer is no"." "He says, "Oh, you must be the one." "Get out the car"." "I say, "What for?" He says, "Drunken driving"." "I say, "I haven't had a drink in 24 hours"." "They shove me into a police car between two beefy deputies holding shotguns." "They drive off." "Suddenly the car turns off the road, starts heading through the woods towards the river." "We come to a place where there's a bunch of men standing around a big tree... with a rope hanging over it." "They fixing' to do some lynching." "All of a sudden, the car with my friend shows up." "So these two deputies, they get cold feet." "They turn around." "They drive me back to town." "The streets are completely empty." "Hell, everybody's down by the river." "(AU DIENCE LAUGH ING)" "So the sheriff says, "Okay, nigger..." ""The magistrate's in that building over yonder." "You go ahead on"." "I say, "You're not gonna shoot me in the back while I'm escaping, are you?"" "He says, "Oh, smartass nigger"." "Takes me over." "The little magistrate, 5-foot-nothing." "He says, "What's up?"" "He say, "Well, we got this here boy for drunken driving"." "I say, "I am not drunk"." "He says, "Do you want to take my test?"" "I said, "Well, what's your test?"" "He said, "I'm a teetotaler, never had a drink in my life." ""But, I can smell liquor a mile off." ""You wanna take a chance?" "Come on, blow your breath on me"." "Well, I blew my breath so hard, I rocked him!" "He said, "What the hell are you boys talking about?" ""This man hasn't had a drink in 24 hours!" ""Get the hell out of here!"" "(AUDIENCE APPLAUDING)" "Well, didn't I get myself on the fastest goddamn train out of there." "(CHUCKLES)" "And I had a drink." "Sat down with a bottle of Wild Turkey and thanked the Lord." "And you know, thought about all the negroes who stayed behind because they were the real heroes." "I met this preacher down there." "Told me he wasn't about to turn the other cheek." "In the glove compartment of his car, he had two items, a Bible and a 45." "He said, "I'll try the bible first"." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "Yeah." "Like I told you, I was on my way to" "Clarendon County, South Carolina." "Now, the superintendent of schools down there had refused to provide a bus for the Scotts Branch School." "It was a little one-room schoolhouse." "We called them doghouse schools." "Harry Briggs was a garage mechanic, who fought during World War II." "His 7-year-old son had to walk five miles to school every day." "So, Harry Briggs filed a complaint charging the school district with violating his son's right to an equal education." "The very next day, the garage owner fired Harry Briggs and we took on the case." "Now, our case simply asked for separate but equal school facilities," "but a judge called Waties Waring..." "Judge Waties Waring, rare Southern Maverick." "He surprised us." "He challenged us to argue the larger question." "Were South Carolina's segregated schools legal under the Constitution?" "You see Judge Waring had forced our hand." "So, now, instead of taking on one little school board, we were challenging the sovereign state of South Carolina." "The governor of South Carolina, James F. Byrnes said, he would spend millions to improve negro schools, but he would never integrate." "This took us to a three-judge court in Charleston, where we would have to prove that segregation actually did harm our clients." "We brought Dr. Kenneth Clark, a social psychologist from New York, down to Clarendon County." "He got off the train with these." "Dr. Clark went to the Scotts Branch School carrying a court order and the two dolls." ""T ell me, son, what color is this doll?" ""And what color is this doll?" ""Which doll looks most like you?" ""Which doll would you like to play with?" ""Which doll do you like the most?" ""Which doll don't you like?"" "Your Honors," "Dr. Kenneth Clark has testified that when negro children were asked to choose between the white doll and the brown doll, and to say which doll was nice, 65 % said, the white doll was the nice doll." "70% said the brown doll was bad." "Every one of our tests shows an unmistakable preference for the white doll and a rejection of the brown doll." "This overwhelmingly suggests segregation has a detrimental effect on the personality development of negro children." "They, like other human beings, who are subjected to an inferior status, are irreparably harmed." "And consider, the moral confusion of the white children." "The white child sees the same people who teach him about Democracy, also teach him to discriminate." "Governor Byrnes tells us he will spend millions to improve negro schools in the future." "He says, "All we ask for is time"." "The Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, ratified in 1868, by all of the states including South Carolina, guarantees rights in the present, not at some time in the future." "If the negro children of Clarendon County, are entitled to any rights as American citizens, they are entitled to those rights now." "Now is the time for the court to act." "Now is the time to end this injustice." "(GAVEL BANGS)" "Well, that 3-judge court acted, all right." "Judge Waring voted for us." "The other two slammed us, ruling for South Carolina, citing Plessy v. Ferguson." "They said, having separate schools for black and white children did not violate the Fourteenth Amendment, and the state should be granted more time to make schools equal." "It just hit me in the gut." "Because I thought we were going to win." "I really believed we were going to win." "You know, the newspapers were crowing." "Keeping school children segregated was going to save America." "So, while South Carolina took its time, negro children would suffer every day." "Day, after day, after day in those doghouse schools." "I have to tell you, sometimes I get a little bit weary of trying to save the white man's soul." "On June 9, 1952, the Supreme Court of the United States... agreed to hear our appeal in the school case, along with other cases that we had in Kansas," "Delaware, Virginia, and right here in the District of Columbia." "All of these cases were bundled together and were called..." "Brown vs. The Board of Education." "So, little Harry Briggs, Jr." "is headed to the Supreme Court." "Now, we spent the next six months preparing, best damn team of lawyers you could ask for, a lot of them trained right here, by Charlie Houston." "But you know, many negroes thought we were wrong going to the Supreme Court, challenging segregation head on." "They said, if we lost, we'd be back in the ditch for another 20 years." "I knew it was time to roll the dice." ""Brothers and sisters, this is 1952..." ""300 years since we were first brought here on slave ships." ""Nearly 100 years, since the Emancipation Proclamation." ""Do you want to wait forever?" ""If we don't challenge segregation, head on, now," ""we are going to continue getting what we've been getting, separate but unequal." ""Now, the NAACP made a decision to strike down segregation." ""I say, we will go where we said we would go." ""I say, damn the torpedoes." ""Let the Supreme Court decide"." "Do you know who Governor Byrnes enlisted to represent South Carolina?" "None other than John W. Davis, the lawyer's lawyer." "Now Davis believed the law was on his side." "He said, "It is wrong for" ""nine men in Washington to tell a man in" ""South Carolina, who his daughter has to sit next to in school"." "(FOOTSTEPS PATTERING)" "I climbed those steps to the Supreme Court, on a cold, rainy December morning." "Saw a line of people stretched all the way down the steps towards the Capitol dome, most of them were black and poor, and counting on us." "I read those words carved in stone," ""Equal Justice Under Law"." "I sure hope so." "MAN ON SPEAKER:" "All rise!" "The Honorable, the Chief Justice, and the Associate Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States..." "Oyez!" "Oyez!" "Oyez!" "All persons having business before the Honorable, the Supreme Court... of the United States, are invited to draw near and give their attention, for the court is now sitting." "God save the United States and this honorable court." "(GAVE L BAN GS)" "May it please the court?" "I speak on behalf of Harry Briggs, Jr... and the negro school children of Clarendon County, who have raised their attack... on the validity of the South Carolina code, that says," ""It shall be unlawful for pupils of one race..." ""to attend the schools provided for persons of another race"." "In the lower courts, we produced unchallenged experts who testified that segregation destroys the self-respect of negro children... and stamps them with a badge of inferiority." "Under our form of government, the only testing ground is to whether or not, the majority violates the individual's rights, is in this, the Supreme Court of the United States." "This court must weigh the rights of these negro children against the state policy of South Carolina, and if that policy violates their rights, then this court is obliged to say, reluctantly or otherwise," "that that policy has run up against the Fourteenth Amendment, which guarantees to all citizens, equal treatment under the law." "(GAVEL BANGS)" "Yes, Justice Reed." "Oh, the state does have a responsibility to maintain law and order." " Now I believe that..." " (GAVEL BANGS)" "Uh, no, Justice Frankfurter it would not be gerrymandering of school districts." " We would simply." "Sir..." " (GAVEL CONTINUES BANGING)" "I think it's important to establish principle." "Segregation by..." "Sir, it would be impossible, right now, to say precisely how it would work." "Frankfurter shot back at me." ""It is very important, Mr. Marshall," ""before one starts out, to know where one is going"." "(GAVEL BANGS)" "You have less than an hour to make your case." "The Justices can interrupt you whenever they please and they really peppered me." "They interrupted me 43 times." "Look, I knew this was our one opportunity to... convince them that segregation was morally wrong, but..." "I got unhinged by their questions." "John W. Davis had argued 138 cases before the Supreme Court, more than any lawyer in history, except for Daniel Webster." "He spoke softly, as if to old friends." ""May it please the court?" ""The resolution proposing the Fourteenth Amendment" ""was proffered by Congress in June, 1866." ""One month later, the same Congress proceeded to establish..." ""separate schools for the races, right here," ""in the District of Columbia," ""and from that good day to this," ""the Congress has not wavered in the policy." ""So, clearly, the Congress does not believe..." ""that the Constitution speaks against segregated schools." ""In Plessy v. Ferguson," ""and in six subsequent decisions by this court," ""nothing can be found that modifies the doctrine of separate but equal." ""So, Your Honors, I might ask," ""why should this be a matter of great national policy?" ""Is it not a fact, that the very strength" ""and fiber of our federal system," ""is local self-government?" ""Of all of the activities of government," ""is not the one that most nearly approaches the hearts and minds of the people," ""the question of the education of their young?" ""I respectfully submit, there is no reason the court should reverse the findings" ""of 90 years"." "When Davis walked out of that courtroom, he said to Governor Byrnes," ""I think we've got it won, 6-to-3, maybe 5-to-4." ""In the language of General Stonewall Jackson," ""We have them and they will never see home"." "(THUNDER RUMBLING)" "That night," "I walked the streets in the rain, no hat, no coat, no pride." "Remembering the days, when I had come over from Howard and stood in the back of the chamber." "Thought about all those people I saw lined up in the rain that morning, little Harry Briggs, Jr." "the other children, and those doghouse schools, they were counting on me." "Most important goddamn case of the century!" "What do I do?" "I get tangled up in their questions." "It reminded me of something that Charlie Houston used to tell us." "He used to say," ""The difference between doctors and lawyers," ""is that doctors can bury their mistakes"." "(AU DIENCE LAUGHING)" "When I got back to the hotel, with my chin on the floor," "Buster took one look at me, and said, "Thurgood," ""pull up your socks"." "More than anything," "Buster and I had wanted to start a family, and she goes, breaks the news, she's pregnant." "Well, of course, first thing I say is, "We'll name him Thurgood!"" "She says, "Well, what if it's a girl?"" ""If it's a girl, we'll still name him Thurgood"." "So, we went back to New York to await the decision." "And, while Chief Justice Vinson and the others weighed our case, outside, pressure mounted." "Some governors came right out, said that, they would resist any order to integrate their schools." "So, people began to say, "Well, what if the Supreme Court issues an opinion," ""and states refuse to obey?" ""You know, the Supreme Court doesn't have an army"." "Now, you know how, um, we negroes claim to have a sixth sense?" "We can detect whether or not a white person is for us or against us." "(AU DIENCE LAUGHING)" "Anyway, my sixth sense told me, that Chief Justice Vinson was my enemy." "See, you have to understand, all during this time, our offices at the legal defense fund are fighting discrimination, wherever they can find it." "I had a big file called "soldier trouble"." "Oh..." "We had gotten complaints from Korea, about the treatment of negro soldiers serving under General MacArthur." "You remember General Douglas MacArthur?" ""Old soldiers never die, they just fade away"." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "You might not know this." "Uh, during World War II, negro soldiers were assigned to segregated units, commanded by white officers." "And, um, after the war," "President Truman made a lot of people very unhappy." "He signed an executive order that desegregated all the armed forces." "General MacArthur just never got around to obeying It." "So, we had reports that, 39 negro soldiers from the 24th Infantry, had been court-martialed for cowardice, disobeying orders." "And 3 of them had been sentenced to life imprisonment... in trials lasting less than 10 minutes." "So, the NAACP decided I should go out to Korea." "I don't know." "I guess, they thought I was expendable." "When I applied for a passport, I found out that General MacArthur had been calling the FBI, had asked for information about my sex life, what he referred to as my "Communist affiliations"." "I got the passport." "But, the General and I weren't off to a good start." "Now, I knew men in the 24th Infantry." "Men, like Lieutenant Leon Gilbert, who had two bronze stars, had led his 35 men up a hill, called Bloody Ridge, three times." "He lost 30 of them." "A white captain ordered him to go back up the hill with the surviving men." "He said, "Sir, if I can't take that hill with 35, I'll never take it with four"." "Well, four nights later, Lieutenant Gilbert was court-martialed and sentenced to death by firing squad." "So now, um, I finally get to MacArthur's headquarters in Japan." "He comes in wearing a chest full of medals, sunglasses." "He says, "Marshall." "You ought to get over to Korea," ""get a look at some combat"." "See, I knew he thought I was expendable." "I get to Korea." "I'm riding in a Jeep with my escort, Colonel D. D. Martin." "Shells start coming in on us now, exploding like hell, everywhere." " (BOMBS EXPLODING)" " So, people are running for cover." "Colonel Martin dives into a ditch." "He says," ""Where is he?" "Where's Thurgood?" "Underneath you, God damn it!"" "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "I don't need no instruction on how to run!" "I finish my investigation." "I go back to MacArthur." "I remind him that the United States Navy has integrated," "I also tell him it only took the Air Force one day to end discrimination." "They gave an order." "It happened." "He tells me, "Well, at such time as I find negroes, who are qualified." ""They'll be integrated, and not before"." "I say "General, I just spoke with a negro sergeant," ""who has killed more of the enemy than anyone in his command." ""He's not qualified?" "No," said the General." ""General, you remember yesterday, you had that" ""beautiful brass band playing out on your parade ground?"" ""Why yes, wasn't that wonderful?"" ""Yes, sir, General, it was delightful." ""I don't recall seeing one negro soldier playing in that band." "Now," ""just between you and me," ""God damn it, don't tell me you can't find a negro who can blow a horn"." "Well, that's when he told me it was time for me to go." "Now everyone knows that war is hell." "Everyone knows that." "But, in Korea I found out what a special hell it is, for brave men to fight and die overseas, for freedoms they've never known at home." "Now, we were able to get, uh, Lieutenant Gilbert's sentence commuted." "He did have to spend five years in prison." "(AIRPLANE ENGINE WHIRRING)" "I was, uh, 6,000 miles from home, when I got word from Buster, that, um," "we had lost the baby." "We had tried everything." "It was our third miscarriage." "On that long plane ride home, I added it all up." "I had been on the road, over 200 nights that year." "Away from your wife that much, is not the best way to be a good husband." "And then, a bombshell." "The court ordered both sides to come back and re-argue the case." "Focusing on this question," ""What evidence was there that the framers of the Fourteenth Amendment" ""had contemplated that it would outlaw segregation in public schools?"" "Now, I had had clients on death row who'd been... saved by a governor with a stay of execution." "Now I understood how they felt." "You see, we had a second chance." "So, pretty soon, our offices were just filled with lawyers and scholars, all doing research on the history of the States... that had ratified the Fourteenth Amendment, and we were running out of money." "I spent half my time on the phone, you know, begging people for help." "And then, one night at home, I noticed something." ""Buster, where are your pearl earrings?"" ""I sold them". "You sold them?"" ""I sent the money to the NAACP"." ""Look, I don't want you selling your jewelry"." ""Thurgood, what if your mother hadn't sold her rings?" "Where would you be today?"" "Buster had her own way of sending me to the furnace room." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "So, we were doing late-night sessions." "Uh, a young lawyer had come on board, a white guy from Texas, named Black, Charlie Black." "Now, some of our guys were nervous about having him in our strategy sessions, suspicious of his Texas roots." "Now, one night, Bob Carter says in front of everybody," ""I've been meaning to ask you, Mr. Black," ""why with all the opportunities before you, have you ended up working here," ""at the NAACP for $200 a month?"" ""I'll tell you." ""Um, I come from deep, deep in Texas." ""So deep, I can't even remember hearing the word, Republican," ""before I was 18 years old." "But," ""I had heard of this really terrible organization up North" ""called the NAACP." ""It was a terrible place," ""with a great big office way up there, in, uh, New York City." ""And the worst thing of all, they said was that inside this office, there was this," ""this room, this special, secret room" ""with no windows, and no doors, and walls about a foot thick." ""And, they said that the only way you could get inside this room" ""was with the combination to this huge lock." ""And they said that inside this room," ""that there was nothing but hooks on the walls, hundreds and hundreds of hooks." ""And, do you know what they said was on each and every one of those hooks?" ""Why, they said that, on each and every one of those hooks," ""was the key to the bedroom of a Southern white woman." "(AU DIENCE LAUGH ING)" ""So I figured," ""that's the kind of organization I want to get involved in!"" "Oh, and then, one more bombshell..." "A phone call at midnight that Chief Justice Vinson has died of a heart attack." "So now, we start trying to think, who is President Eisenhower going to appoint as the new chief justice?" "Four days before the opening of the new term, we get our answer." "It seems that Ike had made a deal at the Republican Convention." "And, promised the next vacant seat on the Supreme Court to California's Governor, Earl Warren." "Now, Warren was the man, who, during World War II, sent 80,000 Japanese-American citizens, living in California, to internment camps." "Would he be your choice?" "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "I told Buster that I was going to make the most of this second chance." "MAN ON SPEAKER:" "God save the United States and this honorable court." "(GAVEL BANGS)" "John W. Davis let everyone know, that this was his swan song, his final argument." "You could see the great esteem for him on the faces of the nine Justices." ""May it please the court?" ""Your Honors, the old horn doesn't honk as loud as it used to," ""but I hope you can hear me." ""In Clarendon School District, Number One, in South Carolina, the state" ""has now provided the negro children with schools that are" ""equal in every respect." ""In fact, because of their being newer," ""they may be even better than the schools for the white children." ""Who would want to disturb this situation?" ""There are 2,790" ""registered negro children of school age in Clarendon County." ""There are 290 whites." ""If you took the negro children," ""and co-mingled them with the white children," ""you would have, in each classroom," ""27 negro children and three white children." ""Would this make the children any happier?" ""Would they learn more quickly?" ""Your Honors cannot sit as a glorified Board of Education" ""for South Carolina." ""We think it a thousand pities that South Carolina might be ordered" ""to abandon that which it has created." ""South Carolina has equal education," ""not prophesized but present." ""I suggest it should not be thrown away" ""on some fancied question of racial prestige." ""It is not my place to offer advice to the learned counsel on the other side." ""No doubt, they believe that what they propose is best." ""But, I urge them to remember the age-old motto," ""The best is often the enemy of the good"." "When he finished, the old man had tears in his eyes." "And, so did one or two of the Justices." "May it please the court?" "As I understand the position, of the distinguished defense counsel, his justification for segregation in South Carolina is, one, that they all just got together, and decided amongst themselves that it is best for the races to be separated." "And, two, that segregation has existed for over a century." "Neither argument, to my mind, is any good." "The negroes who are forced to submit to segregation are all American citizens, who, by accident of birth, are a different color." "Color makes no difference insofar as this court is concerned." "The Fourteenth Amendment was put into our Constitution, after a bloody civil war." "The duty of enforcing it, is placed upon this court, to make sure that the states disregard little pet feelings about race." "Harry Briggs, Jr." "is guaranteed 12 years of education." "There is no way you can repay lost school years." "But they say, "Leave it to the states until they work it out"." "The only way, this court can decide this case, in opposition to our position, is to find, for some reason, that negroes are inferior to all other human beings." "No one will stand up in this court and say that, because they would have to justify it." "Only one thing can justify continued segregation." "That is a determination, that the people who were once held in slavery, be kept as near to that condition as is possible." "And now is the time, we submit, that the court make it clear, that that is not what the Constitution of the United States stands for." "(GAVEL BANGS)" "Now, it was in their hands." "Now, we would have months to wait, and waiting makes me itchy." "And, I was worried about Chief Justice Warren." "He was a politician who'd never served on a court before, so his judicial philosophy was unknown." "I did find out later that during the court's deliberations," "Chief Justice Warren made some trips to visit Civil War Battlefields." "His chauffeur, a negro who served during World War II, drove him out to Gettysburg." "Warren contemplated the graves, looked at the monument with Lincoln's simple words." "Warren stopped at a Virginia Inn for the night." "In the morning, he woke, he saw his car parked under a tree, saw his chauffeur sleeping in the back seat." "He woke him." ""Why are you sleeping in the car?"" ""Mr. Justice, there's no place within 20 miles of here, where I can get a room"." "Then, late one night in May, I got the tip on the phone." "Oh, I was on the first train down to Washington." "Practically ran from Union Station to the court." "Then, I was climbing those steps..." "I was huffing a little bit." "(HEROIC MUSIC PLAYS)" "I stood in the back of the crowded chamber." "I watched the nine Justices in their black robes file in." "Chief Justice Warren opened a black leather folder." ""Equal Justice Under Law?"" "We'll see." "MAN ON SPEAKER:" "I have for announcement, the opinion of the court in Brown v. The Board of Education." "In approaching this question, we cannot turn the clock back to 1868, when the Fourteenth Amendment was adopted, or even to 1896, when Plessy v. Ferguson was written." "We must consider public education in the light of its present place in American life." "We come to the question," ""Does segregation of children in public schools," ""solely on the basis of race," ""even though the physical facilities may be equal," ""deprive the children of the minority group" ""of equal educational opportunities?"" "We believe, unanimously, that it does." "We conclude that in the field of public education, the doctrine of "separate but equal" has no place." "Therefore, we hold that the plaintiffs are deprived of the equal protection of the laws guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment." "It is so ordered." "(GAVE L BAN GS)" "May 17, 1954." "The highest court in the nation had ruled that..." "America could no longer humiliate her colored citizens by setting them apart." "Earl Warren led the nine justices to a unanimous decision, hoping that their unity would send a strong signal to the rest of the country." "The very next day, I told the New York Times," "I expected school segregation to end in America in five years, over with, finished." "And then, the governor of Virginia announced, he would use "every legal means" to continue segregated schools." "And, Strom Thurmond led 97 congressmen to sign a Southern manifesto vowing to defy the Supreme Court." "See, I thought it was President Eisenhower's duty to stand up, tell the country that Brown is the law of the land, and use his executive power to enforce the decision." "But, do you know what Ike said when they asked him what he thought about it?" "He said he didn't have an opinion one way or the other." "If Ike had fought World War II, the way he fought for civil rights, we'd all be speaking German today." "And, it meant that our country would have to go through a long, painful process." "You know, there were bus boycotts, and marches, and sit-ins." "And, you know, we worked around the clock, getting people out of jail." "Martin Luther King, great leader." "But, he would dump all his legal work on us, including the bills." "Oh, I had a lot of fights with Martin about his theory of disobeying the law." "Look, see, I didn't believe in that." "My approach was to use the law, not to break it." "I told Martin, I said, "You have two rights." "You have a right" ""to disobey the law." "You also have a right to go to jail for it"." "And, you know, Martin kept talking to me about" "Henry David Thoreau's, Theory of Civil Disobedience." "I would remind him." "Thoreau wrote Civil Disobedience in jail." "(AU DIENCE LAUGHING)" "I knew that Buster hadn't been well during the school case, but she had always insisted that she was well enough to, you know, come down here to Washington," "be in court, except for the decision..." "She didn't make that trip." "It was then, when she could no longer hide, that I found out how sick she really was." "She said she hadn't wanted to add to my burden." "What kind of man has a wife dying of cancer and doesn't know it?" "She was gone in six months." "Buster died February 11th..." "It was her 44th birthday." "I had never been alone before." "You know, my uncle Fearless was gone." "My daddy was gone." "Charlie Houston was gone." "So with Buster gone, well, I lost 30 pounds." "Kept a bottle in my desk for company." "I was rude, irritable." "Nobody wanted to be around me." "Eventually, I was able to pour myself back into my work." "You see, the resistance to the school case, meant that we had to pull up our socks." "Go into courtrooms all over the South." "See, the decision gave us a precedent." "We had our foot in the door." "Now, equal means integrated." "We could challenge segregation in... libraries, and restaurants, and public toilets." "See, when I was growing up, in Baltimore, there were very few public toilets for colored people." "So, when you felt something, the best you could do was hop on the trolley for home and hope." "I remember one day, I got off the trolley, only made it as far as the front door of our house." "You never forget something like that." "All of these things, they happened too late for my mother and my daddy." "But, those old, "White Only" signs in Baltimore were finally coming down." "Well now, I'd say, it's about five years after the Brown case." "And, I finally decide it's time for me to stop traveling 100,000 miles a year." "You know, it's time for me to go into a big law firm." "You know, do something that I had never managed to do." "Make myself a bunch of money." "I'd started seeing Cecilia Suyat, who worked in our office." "Cissy had a sense of humor that really kept me in line." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "Soon, we married." "And before too long, she made me a very happy man." "Along came Thurgood, Jr." "He was a boy." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "And, uh, our other son, John." "Oh, so now I get a phone call from the new, Attorney General Robert Kennedy." "Tells me that President Kennedy has decided, to make me a judge on The Federal Court of Appeals, second highest court in the country." "Now people call me a liar when I say this, but when I was a young lawyer, back in Baltimore, my highest aim was to become a county magistrate." "You know, just like that little teetotaler back in T ennessee." "You know, back then, there were only two negro judges in the entire country." "That's right." "So..." "The chief judge on the Federal Court of Appeals, he made my, uh, my swearing in, in New York a nice deal, nice deal." "Organized a group photograph with all the other judges." "And uh, well, just before everyone arrived, the photographer took a test shot and blew a fuse." "(FUSE BLOWS)" "So, I come in a few minutes later." "There are people milling around in the dark, you know." "This flustered secretary spots me." "She says, "Oh, thank God, the electrician!"" ""Lady, you must be crazy," ""if you think a colored man could become an electrician in New York City"." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "Well, at first, you know, I was the, uh, the low man on the court, dealing with the least interesting cases." "Uh, like taxes and corporate law, and" "I would get all the Wall Street securities cases, 'cause the other judges owned stock and had conflicts of interest." "I used to say, "How nice for you boys to have..." ""a poor man on the bench to handle all this stuff for you"." "But, let the record show," "I wrote 98 majority opinions." "Not a one of them was overturned by the Supreme Court." "(AUDIENCE APPLAUDING)" "So, one day, I'm sitting in the, uh, judges' dining room." "Bailiff comes in, "Judge, Judge!"" ""Fred, I told you not to bother me while I'm eating"." ""But Judge, the president wants to talk to you"." ""The president of what?"" ""The President of the United States, LBJ"." ""Judge Marshall, I want you to be the Solicitor General of the United States"." ""Thank you, Mr. President." "That is a great honor..." ""I'd like some time to talk it over with Mrs. Marshall"." ""Take as much time as you need"." "The next day, I get to the office." "The phone rings." "It's Lyndon Johnson." ""Mr. President, I thought you said I'd have some time"." ""You had time!"" "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" ""Well, number one, sir, it's a salary loss of $5,000"." ""I know that"." ""Number two, sir, I'd be giving up a lifetime job on the court"." ""I know that"." ""And finally, sir, I haven't got any money"." ""I know that, too." "I've got your income tax report sitting right here in front of me"." "And then, right over the phone, LBJ took me by the ears." ""Thurgood, I want people to go into the Supreme Court building," ""and see a black man standing there" ""in the Solicitor's cutaway coat and ask the question," "'Who is that negro up there?"" ""And hear the answer," ""He is the Solicitor General of the United States"." "Well, by the time LBJ got finished with me," "I was ashamed I hadn't volunteered." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "So, Cissy and the boys, we moved back down here to Washington." "It looked like this old, Pullman dining car waiter from Baltimore, was about to become the highest-ranking negro, ever to serve in the United States Government. (CHUCKLES)" "Now, there had been some rumors that if a vacancy came up on the Supreme Court, that LBJ might appoint me." "But, the politicians were telling Johnson," ""His putting a negro on that court," ""oh, that would cost him the South in the '68 election"." "So, the night that Justice Tom Clark resigned, we all went to a party in his honor." "President pulled me aside and said, "Don't expect the job"." "Well, that put me back on my heels, you know." "Well, I wanted that job." "I thought I'd earned It." "But, I figured some no-good, sons of bitches had stoked up LBJ, you know, with rumors... about me, and booze, and women." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "Anyway, the next morning, he calls me over to the Oval Office." "I figure, to tell me why he's not appointing me." "He says "You know, Thurgood, I'm going to put you on the Supreme Court"." ""Thank you, Mr. President"." ""Have you told Cissy yet?"" ""Well, how could I tell her?" "I didn't know anything." ""Oh, she'll be shocked"." ""Well, God damn it, let's get her on the speaker phone." "We'll break the news!"" "So, before you know it, LBJ's got Cissy on speaker phone." "I say, "Hi, honey"." "She says, "Hi, Thurgood." ""Did we get the Supreme Court appointment?"" "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "Well, you never heard a man laugh like LBJ." "He says, "Well, Thurgood, I guess our friendship's about busted up now." ""I don't reckon, I'll be seeing you much"." ""Well, Mr. President, you know," ""Justice Tom Clark stayed best friends with President Truman," ""even after he voted against the president's wishes"." ""Clark really socked it to Truman in that steel case." ""I would have no hesitation, socking it to you"." "He just stared at me." ""You mean you'd do that to me?"" ""You bet!"" "And then he shook my hand, said, "Well, I'm glad we understand each other"." "Oh, you have to understand, these were tough political times." "LBJ was twisting senators' arms to get me confirmed." "It got nasty." "The vote was 69 for me, 11 against." "Johnson convinced 20 Southern Democrats not to vote at all." "So, they could, you know, cover their asses in the next election." "Then, he called me." "He said, "Well..." ""Congratulations, Mr. Justice Marshall." ""But, goddamn, the hell you caused me!" ""I have never been through so much hell"." ""Well, Mr. President, it was your idea, it wasn't mine"." "Oh..." "I was sworn in, in the Rose Garden of The White House, by my good friend," "Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black, a former member of the Ku Klux Klan." "And, you know, I would wear this robe for nearly 25 years." "Now the life of a justice, well, it, it's far different from the, uh, the hurly-burly of the courtroom." "You know, tell you God's truth." "I missed the action at first." "Well, you know, you hear cases, you read briefs, you, uh, think." "You sit in conference with the other eight Justices, the most secret and private of all gatherings." "And then, you think some more." "And, you write." "I wrote opinions in 322 cases." "You know, sitting on that bench, uh, listening to cases being argued, my mind would often drift back to the sounds of those prisoners in the Northwest Baltimore Police Station." "You see, this is why I did everything in my power to protect the civil rights of every American citizen." "See, I say that the death penalty is cruel and unusual punishment, which is prohibited by the Eighth Amendment." "They say it's a deterrent." "Well, hell, if it was really a deterrent, there never would have been a second execution after the first one." "I mean, as a defense attorney, I fought hard to get innocent men... life imprisonment, instead of the gas chamber, this left time for new evidence and appeals." "I was the only one on the court who'd ever tried a murder case." "I had seen too many poor, innocent defendants just sentenced to death." "You know, think about this." "There are 70 countries in the world that forbid capital punishment." "Wouldn't America pay herself the highest tribute, by recognizing the humanity of her fellow human beings, settling for life imprisonment without parole?" "On the Warren court, we put a stop to all executions in 1967, and then Nixon was elected." "He was able to appoint four justices in just four years." "So, the executions started all over again." "I was writing a dissent in every capital punishment case that came before us." "But, by that time, all the other judges had grown so close together, they were all peeing through the same quill." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "Oh, I left instructions for my clerks to wake me at any hour, if a request for a stay of execution came through." "I also told them, I said, "Look, if I die, prop me up, keep on voting"." "(LAUGHING)" "And, you know, I am for gun control, complete gun control." "I don't see why a private citizen, has to, uh..." "carry a pistol or a machine gun." "I don't see it." "You know, during the school case, we had a lot of mean phone calls." "One time, the Chief of Police of New York called me up." "Invited me out for a drink." "He said, "Thurgood, we're worried about you"." "Handed me a little package wrapped up as a gift." "I open it up." "There was a 32 inside with some ammunition." "(LAUGHS) I hand it right back to him." "I say, "Chief," ""my weapon is the law." "I just have to do the best I can with that"." "You see, I wrote opinions based on the First Amendment." "And I believe, that whatever justifications there may be for, um, regulating obscenities, it does not extend into the privacy of one's own home." "If the First Amendment means anything, it means, no state has any business, uh, telling a man, sitting alone in his own home, what books he can read, what films he can watch." "Our constitutional heritage, rebels at the thought of giving government the power to control men's minds." "You know, we had to screen some pornographic movies on one of those cases." "Oh, that was a fun assignment." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "You know, when it ended, I turned to the Chief Justice." "I say, "Did you learn anything new from that?" "I didn't"." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "You know, when you're appointed to the Supreme Court, it's a lifetime job, and presidents love to make Supreme Court appointments." "They can't do that now, unless there's an empty seat." "Now, in the spring of 1970, I came down with a, a bad case of pneumonia, you know, a bad case of pneumonia." "Had to go into Bethesda Naval Hospital." "Well, word had gotten out that I was much sicker than people realized." "Well, a few weeks later, I was feeling better." "Head of the hospital come in." "He said, "Justice Marshall, we've gotten a request" ""for a report on your condition," ""but I wouldn't dream of releasing it, without your permission"." "I said, "Well, who wants it?" He said, "President Nixon"." "I said, "Well, all right, you go ahead." "You release it, providing" ""you write, in great big letters at the bottom," ""not yet, God damn it!"" "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "(LAUGHING) And he did it, too." "Uh, you know, during the, uh..." "Reagan years, a lot of people... wanted me off the court." "Said I was, uh, well, said I was too old." "Uh, too liberal, too tipsy." "Well, I'd tell them that I had accepted a lifetime appointment." "I'm staying for life." "I expect to die at the age of 110, shot by a jealous husband." "(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)" "Yeah." "You know, you should know, that from time to time, Cissy would get after me, about my being too soft on our boys." "And I would get defensive." "I say, "No, no," ""I'm not going to punish those boys for anything I did"." "She said, "Well, you'll never punish them for anything, 'cause you did everything"." "(SIGHS) So, one day," "I, uh, took off my robe." "It was to be my last day on the court, but nobody knew this." "I walked around the bench." "Found myself standing on the same spot, I stood, when I argued the school case." "I address my fellow justices." ""May it please the court?" ""I stand here with my son, Thurgood Marshall, Jr..." ""and my daughter-in-law, Colleen Mahoney." ""Honorable Justices, I am here to vouch for their standing as lawyers," ""and to recommend their admittance to the bar" ""of the Supreme Court of the United States." ""Seated in the third row with Cissy," ""is our other son, John," ""a United States Marshall, man of the law." ""Would that be bragging, if I told you, that was the proudest day of my life?" "(PATRIOTIC MUSIC PLAYS)" ""Cissy and I, have made a decision." ""I have given 50 years to the law," ""and this is it"." "What?" "Oh, the most important?" "Well, uh, two cases, beating the white primary voting system, in Texas, yes," "Smith v. Allwright, and Brown v. The Board of Education." "But the sweetest, was getting Donald Gaines Murray admitted to The U niversity of Maryland Law School." "Oh, I was young, hungry for revenge." "Say what?" "Oh, should a negro replace me?" "Well, uh, look, um, presidents hand out Supreme Court appointments, I don't." "I'd be opposed to them picking the wrong negro, and saying, "Oh, I'm picking him, because he's a negro"." "(AUDIENCE APPLAUDING)" "My dad told me, there's no difference between a white snake and a black snake." "They both bite." "I've always believed, you know, the basic thrust of our Constitution is people to people." "Strike them, they will cry." "Cut them, they will bleed." "Starve them, they will wither away and die." "But, treat them with respect and decency, give them equal access to the levers of power, attend to their aspirations and their grievances, and they will flourish and grow." "And, yes, join together to form a more perfect union." "Well, yes, yes, we understand how far we've come, but, we also recognize how far we still have to go, don't we?" "And, you know, even though, I'll have "retired" written after my name," "I am going to stay in this fight, until the following thing happens." "And, that is, that on some day in the future, on the commuter train, coming to New York, coming through Connecticut, picking up wealthy people... and bringing them down to Wall Street." "A negro gets on the train up around Fairfield, wearing his Brooks Brothers suit, his derby hat, his dispatch case banged up just enough, you know, Wall Street Journal, up under one arm, and the train keeps moving, stop-by-stop," "picking people up, and eventually it becomes crowded." "And a white woman gets on the train, near the last stop, and she goes up and down the car, and she discovers that there is only one empty seat left, and it is right next to this negro." "So, she sits down in this one empty seat." "And, you know, finally she can't take it any longer." "She yells out, "Niggers!" "Niggers!" "Niggers!"" "And, the negro leaps up and says, "Where?" "Where?" "Where?"" "(AUDIENCE APPLAUDING)" "Say..." "Oh, our country?" "Well, our, our country, uh..." "You know, Langston Hughes, my classmate, he said it pretty well." ""O, let America be America again..." ""The land that never has been yet..." ""And yet must be..." ""The land where every man is free." ""The land that's mine..." "the poor man's, Indian's, Negro's, Me..." ""Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain" ""Must bring back our mighty dream again." ""O, yes," ""I say it plain," ""America never was America to me," ""And yet I swear this oath..." ""America will be!"" "(AUDIENCE APPLAUDING)"