What does Law Day mean to you?

Topic Choices

• Famous Lawyers
• Famous legal decisions
• If you were the leader of your country, what law/s would you pass?
• If you were the leader of your country, what law/s would you end?
• 2020 is the Centennial of the 19th Amendment's Women's Right to Vote

Topic Choices

• If you could pass any rule at your school, which rule would you pass? Why?
• If you could end any rule at your school, which rule would you end? Why?
• Would you be a lawyer for your career? Why or why not?

Topic Choices

• If you were Secretary General of the United Nations which international law/s or treaties would you pass?
• If you were Secretary General of the United Nations which international law/s or treaties would you end?

Topic Choices

• Would you break the law if the law is unjust? Why or why not?
• Is civil disobedience morally justified?

Topic Choices

• Select a famous court case in your country. What happened? Why is the ruling important? Do you agree or disagree with the ruling of the court?
• Brown v. Board of Education: ended racial segregation in American schools.
• Roe v. Wade: right to abortion was constitutional because of right to privacy.

Topic Choices

• Texas v. Johnson: the right to burn the American flag was constitutional freedom of speech.
• Korematsu v. United States: the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II
• Other US Supreme Court decisions: https://www.landmarkcases.org/

Famous Lawyers

Famous Lawyers

• many civil rights leaders and activists started their training in law school and as lawyers.
• others have become Presidents, Prime Ministers and Leaders of nations. For example, the current leaders of both Russia and China were Law School graduates.

Nelson Mandela

Nelson Mandela

• Mandela began studying law at the University of Fort Hare and University of the Witwatersrand, where he was the only black African student and faced racism
• worked as a lawyer in Johannesburg

Gandhi

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Gandhi

• Started as a Lawyer
• very shy student and took a public speaking practice group
• returned to India his law practice failed because of his fear of public speaking.
• went to South Africa for a legal job and that's where his political activism started.

Thurgood Marshall

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Thurgood Marshall

• Father took him to court cases when he was a kid to learn. They would argue about the law over the dinner table.
• Marshall said his father "turned me into [a lawyer]. He did it by teaching me to argue, by challenging my logic on every point, by making me prove every statement I made."

Thurgood Marshall

• Applied to college at Lincoln University and in his application he stated he wanted to become a lawyer.
• Became "star" of the Debate Team in college.

Thurgood Marshall

• graduated #1 in his class from the Howard University School of Law in 1933
• could not attend University of Maryland Law School in his home town because of segregation so he went to Howard University where he graduated #1 in his class.

Thurgood Marshall

• after graduation he eventually went to work as a lawyer for the next 25 years with the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) which fought for civil rights.

Thurgood Marshall

• won the Supreme Court decision of Brown v. Board of Education to desegregate schools.
• became the first African American Supreme Court Justice in 1967

Fatou Bensouda

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Fatou Bensouda

• International Criminal Court's chief prosecutor since June 2012
• Minister of Justice of Gambia
• Legal Adviser and Trial Attorney at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda

Fatou Bensouda

• Time magazine ranked her in the 100 most influential people in the world as a "leading voice pressing governments to support the quest for justice"
• African magazine Jeune Afrique named Bensouda as the 4th most influential person in Africa in the Civil Society category and one of the 100 most Influential African Personalities

Fatou Bensouda

• United States revoked her visa to prevent her & other ICC officials investigating whether US servicemen or US officials engaged in war crimes in Afghanistan, Poland, Romania and Lithuania
• the United Nations criticized the US decision.

Emma Theofelus

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Emma Theofelus

• at the age of 23 became the youngest Cabinet Member in Africa
• law degree from the University of Namibia
• High School and College Debate Team Member
• law degree from the University of Namibia and Lawyer at Ministry of Justice

Asma Jahangir

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Asma Jahangir

• Pakistani human rights lawyer and social activist who co-founded and chaired the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan

Asma Jahangir

• served as the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief
• co-chaired South Asia Forum for Human Rights and was vice president of International Federation for Human Rights.

Asma Jahangir

• first ever women President of Supreme Court Bar Association in the history of Pakistan

Select a Court Case

Landmark US Cases

Brown v. Board of Education

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Korematsu v. USA

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Roe v. Wade

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