Ethics

Constance Baker Motley was the first Black woman to argue a case before the Supreme Court, and in 1966, became the first to serve as a federal judge.

Motley graduated from Columbia Law School in 1946. While studying law, she went to work for the NAACP’s legal staff, joining Robert L. Carter, who later served with Motley as a federal judge.  The boss who hired Motley as NAACP’s first female attorney: future Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall.

In highly unusual en banc news, the Tenth Circuit has decided following panel argument that, rather than issue a panel opinion, it will sit en banc to decide in the first instance whether a pretrial detainee's Sixth Amendment rights were violated when the United States Attorney's Office obtained a recording of a phone conversation with his attorney.

Charlotte E. Ray (born January 13, 1850 - January 4, 1911) became the first African-American woman to graduate from a law school, and the first to formally practice law in the United States in 1872.

In the 19th century, most women – and particularly women of color – were barred from the legal profession. They were forbidden from enrolling in law schools and from obtaining licenses to practice law across the United States. The legal profession was largely controlled by, and reserved for, wealthy white men.

Macon Bolling Allen (1816-1894) is thought to have been born around 1816 in Indiana and later moved to Maine.

In 1931, Jane Bolin became the first Black woman to graduate from Yale Law School. But that is just one of her long list of firsts — Bolin also went on to become the first Black woman to join the New York City Bar Association and the New York City Law Department.

Bryan Stevenson is an attorney, social justice activist, law professor, and founding executive director of the Equal Justice Initiative. His work centers on challenging racial disparities in the criminal justice system.

President Joe Biden presented the National Humanities Medal to Equal Justice Initiative founder Bryan Stevenson at the White House on Tuesday, March 21, 2023.

Mr. Stevenson is a widely acclaimed public interest lawyer who has dedicated his career to helping the poor, the incarcerated, and the condemned. Under his leadership, EJI has won major legal challenges eliminating excessive and unfair sentencing, exonerating innocent death row prisoners, confronting abuse of the incarcerated and the mentally ill, and aiding children prosecuted as adults.

A true trailblazer, Rev. Dr. Pauli Murray was a scholar, activist, writer, and Episcopal priest who was important in the civil and women’s rights movements.

Born in Baltimore, Maryland, as Anna Pauline in 1910, Murray was raised by family members in Durham, North Carolina, after their mother’s death in 1914. From a young age, Murray grappled with the complexities of their racial identity.

After serving for eight years in the District of Columbia Public Defender Service, rising to the position of deputy director, Charles J. Ogletree, Jr., or Tree, as he was affectionately known, was appointed a lecturer at Harvard Law School in 1984.

He is known as “The Man Who Killed Jim Crow” and the first General Counsel of the NAACP, but his contributions don’t stop there.