The Honorable Thurgood Marshall: Working the System

In my opinion, Abraham Lincoln gets way too much credit for freeing black people from slavery. Slavery existed because economic necessity made the notion of one human owning other humans 'common sense.' Slavery was becoming 'economically unnecessary' with Whitney's invention of the cotton gin, and the onslaught of other machinery that 'could do the work of many men.'

As industry progressed, owning slaves started becoming economically unfeasible. Liberia was purchased, so unnecessary slaves could be dumped off in a homeland foreign to them, when Lincoln was just a child.

All black men got after the Civil War (or the War of Northern Aggression, if you prefer) was forty acres and a mule; black women didn't get that much. Black people didn't get rights, educational opportunities, or even a fair shake in business. They would, with thier 'newfound wealth and freedom,' combine their land, build a bunch of shacks on part of the new whole, and live as sharecroppers, because that was the only way the knew how to live here. Believe me, this was better for the 'white economy' because 'white society didn't even have to care if they lived or died' like it did when it needed slave labor the next day.

When you do the math, the freed blacks were better off as slaves! They not only didn't gain anything by being freed, they actually lost social status!

For many decades to come, blacks were lynched for the crime of being black in the wrong place at the right time (or the right place at the wrong time). They were relegated to a status of 'separate but equal,' but nothing was really equal; even in the north where they were more accepted, they had the status of 'integrated but not in white neighborhoods.'

'There was no true justice' until . . . (enter Thurgood Marshall).

To say Thurgood Marshall was the most significant black person in the 20th century does not give him sufficient gravity. Thurgood Marshall is one of the most significant people in American history.

'One argument from Thurgood Marshall' rocketed education for blacks to unbelievable new heights, and educational opportunities for blacks has never stopped accelerating since his argument. Imagine that in physical concept. Now consider the 'exponential benefit' of 'adding that ascending level of knowledge' to the 'whole of knowledge.'

Thurgood Marshall did not just help black people get equal opportunity in education. 'His one argument' will benefit 'all of humankind' 'from that point forever.' (Math works like that.)

Regardless of whatever motive he may have had, Lynden Johnson's greatest decision as President was to nominate The Honorable Thurgood Marshall for the 'highest court in the land.'

Thomas Edison, given better resources and tools, failed 10,000 times before shedding his light on the world; Thurgood Marshall shed the light of justice on his country, and the light of education on the world, with one argument. He should probably be given similar gravity as Edison.