● Constance Baker Motley:
Born September 12, 1921, Constance Baker Motley was a key strategist for the civil rights movement, lawyer, senator, and judge. Motley worked with the NAACP for over 20 years, arguing 12 cases at the Supreme Court level where she would win nine. She even aided Thurgood Marshall in the Brown v. Board of Education case that ended segregation in schools. In 1964, she was elected to the New York State Senate and was the first Black woman to sit in the State Senate. Due to her work, President Lyndon B. Johnson appointed her to the federal judiciary and served as a United States District Judge in New York in 1966, she was the first Black woman to hold the position. Motley died September 28, 2005 at age 84 in New York City.