NSU to host Annual Martin Luther King, Jr.
Commemorative Observance and Freedom March
Norfolk, Va.—Norfolk
State University will kick-off its Black History Month
activities with the annual Martin Luther King, Jr.
Commemorative Observance and Freedom March at 6 p.m.
Thursday, January 17. The symbolic march leaves from the
Lyman Beecher Brooks Library and proceeds to the L.
Douglas Wilder Performing Arts Center. Immediately
following the march, the Honorable John Charles Thomas,
the first African American to serve on the Supreme Court
of Virginia, will deliver the keynote address.
Thomas’ address will focus on this year’s Black
History theme, From Slavery to Freedom: Africans in
the Americas. In 1983, Thomas became a justice of
the Supreme Court of Virginia and served on the bench
for seven years. He authored more than 256 decisions
concerning contracts, torts, real property, trusts and
estates, and taxation, and participated in several
thousand appellate rulings. Thomas now practices law in
Richmond as partner at Hunton & Williams law firm where
he focuses on appellate practice, general litigation and
alternative dispute resolution.
In
2005, Thomas was named a member of the Court of
Arbitration for Sport/Tribunal, which is based in
Lausanne, Switzerland. He also serves as a member of the
College of William & Mary Board of Visitors, Board of
Trustees for the Thomas Jefferson Foundation, Appellate
Rules Advisory Committee of the Commonwealth of
Virginia, the Virginia State Bar Association and a host
of other prestigious organizations.
Thomas
received a bachelor’s degree in American government from
the University of Virginia in 1972 and a law degree from
UVA’s School of Law in 1975.
For
more information, call the Office of Communications and
Marketing at 823-8373.
