The former U.S. attorney general challenges law students to continue Marshall’s fight for justice at the Thurgood Marshall Amenity Center in Upton.
Former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder urged law students to actively participate in shaping a more just society during the inaugural Justice Thurgood Marshall Lecture at Marshall's childhood elementary school in West Baltimore.
The annual lecture series, which kicked off Sept. 25 at the newly renovated Thurgood Marshall Amenity Center in the Upton neighborhood, aims to honor Marshall's legacy and to inspire future generations of legal professionals.
"We can no longer afford to be patient," Holder told the audience, which included students from the University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law, Howard University School of Law, and the University of Baltimore (UB) School of Law.
"We must let ourselves feel injustices — and then fight for that which is right," said Holder, who served as the 82nd attorney general of the United States and was the first African American to hold the office.
The event's location holds special significance, according to Larry Gibson, LLB, Morton & Sophia Macht Professor of Law at Maryland Carey Law. "This is Thurgood Marshall's elementary school," Gibson said. "We are one block from where his grandparents had their store at Division and Dolphin. We are three blocks down the street on Division from where Thurgood Marshall lived during his youth," recounted Gibson, who authored two books about the nation’s first Black Supreme Court Justice.
The lecture series is supported by an endowment held at the University of Maryland Baltimore Foundation, connecting the University to Marshall's legacy. Fourteen law firms and individual sponsors have contributed to the endowment to date.