Thurgood Marshall attends Port Chicago trial, NAACP challenges military racism

Thurgood Marshall, chief counsel of the NAACP, attended the Port Chicago mutiny trial in September 1944, called the mass court-martial an injustice, and demanded a government investigation of the Navy's practice of assigning Black sailors exclusively to dangerous segregated support roles. His high-profile intervention brought national attention to military racism and contributed directly to the organizing pressure that led to Truman's 1948 desegregation order.