Cecilia “Cissy” Marshall, the spouse of the late Supreme Courtroom Justice and civil rights icon Thurgood Marshall, died on Tuesday at age 94, the courtroom’s public data workplace introduced.
Like her husband, Marshall had labored for the NAACP within the 1940s and ’50s. She was born in Hawaii and moved to New York, the place she turned a stenographer, in response to particulars of her adolescence supplied by the courtroom. No reason for demise was given.
Thurgood Marshall, the primary Black justice within the courtroom’s historical past, had retired in 1991 and died in 1993. However Cecilia Marshall, recognized for her heat, exuberance, and enduring curiosity within the courtroom, continued to attend oral arguments and extracurricular courtroom festivities, usually with their son Thurgood Marshall Jr.
“You needed to take a seat subsequent to her at any occasion,” Chief Justice John Roberts stated in an announcement Tuesday that captured her persona. “She had a straightforward humorousness that might be – in an acceptable setting, in fact – a bit saucy.”
He famous that Marshall usually sat in a reserved part for spouses at oral arguments and Supreme Courtroom Historic Society occasions. Roberts stated she not often missed an investiture or different Supreme Courtroom event.
Justice Elena Kagan, who was a regulation clerk for Justice Marshall in the course of the 1987-88 session, stated in an announcement on Tuesday, “Each clerk to Justice Marshall acquired a kind of bonus: the steadfast friendship and help of his spouse Cissy. She was a wonderful lady, and all of us beloved and admired her. The neighborhood of TM clerks will right this moment really feel an ideal loss.”
Born Cecilia Suyat in 1928 in Pu’unene, Maui, in Hawaii, she would later transfer to New York Metropolis, the place she took night time lessons at Columbia College to develop into a stenographer. She labored for the Nationwide Affiliation for the Development of Coloured Folks (NAACP) from 1948-1955.
Thurgood Marshall, earlier than becoming a member of the bench in 1967, led the NAACP Authorized Protection and Schooling Fund. In that place, he was chief counsel for the collection of circumstances that led to the historic Brown v. Board of Schooling resolution hanging down the “separate however equal” doctrine in public colleges.
The couple married in December 1955 and had two sons, Thurgood Jr. and John.
Cecilia Marshall, who lived in Falls Church, Virginia, served through the years on the board of the NAACP Authorized Protection Fund and the Supreme Courtroom Historic Society. The Supreme Courtroom public data workplace stated she was additionally energetic in church actions and neighborhood service. Along with her two sons, she is survived by 4 grandchildren and three nice grandchildren.
This text was initially printed by cnn.com. Learn the unique article right here.
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