Clark University - Clarknews summer 2004
Commencement 2004: The long road to human freedom
Can one person really make a difference in the world?
Hon. Margaret Marshall, chief justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, posed this question to graduates and their family and friends in her keynote address at Clark’s 99th Commencement Exercises. Clark conferred 442 bachelor’s degrees, 486 master’s degrees and 27 doctoral degrees at the ceremony, held May 23 on the campus green.
Marshall, who received an honorary doctor of laws degree at the ceremony, is the first woman to serve as chief justice of the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts and only the second woman to serve on the court in its more than 300-year history. A native of South Africa, Marshall received her B.A. from Witwatersrand University in Johannesburg in 1966. As president of the National Union of South African Students from 1966 to 1968, she led antiapartheid activities and protests amid threatening government opposition. With a full scholarship, Marshall earned a master’s degree from Harvard Graduate School of Education in 1969 and went on to receive a J.D. from Yale Law School in 1976. She became a U.S. citizen in 1978. Before her appointment to Massachusetts’ highest court, she was a partner at the Boston law firms of Csaplar & Bok and Choate, Hall & Stewart and was general counsel of Harvard University.
Appointed chief justice in 1999 by Governor Paul Cellucci, Marshall has presided over several notable cases. Most recently, Marshall delivered the majority opinion declaring it unconstitutional in Massachusetts to deny marriage rights to same-sex couples. This decision has reverberated throughout the nation, but Marshall did not discuss it in her address. Rather, she answered her opening question by giving several examples throughout history of individuals who have profoundly changed the world by pursuing equality under the law in the United States.
Among the people Marshall mentioned were: Quock Walker, a slave in nearby Barre, Mass., in the 18th century, who sued for his freedom in a case that ended slavery in Massachusetts; Linda Brown, the plaintiff in Brown vs. Board of Education, the case that prohibited segregation in schools because separate is inherently unequal; and Donna Newman, the lawyer for detainee Jose Padilla, who recently went before the U.S. Supreme Court to argue for Padilla’s right to meet with his attorney.
Marshall described the individuals involved in these landmark court cases as "plaintiffs who were everyday people with amazing resolve." Though generations apart, she said, they all "shared unshakable faith in a constitutional promise of equality and justice."
"Their stories have particular resonance for me because I know what it was like to live without the constitutional guarantees of individual and property rights," said Marshall, who then described her life in South Africa during the apartheid era of government oppression and tyranny. During that time, she explained, disagreement with the racial system of apartheid was a crime.
As a university student, Marshall saw many of her professors imprisoned, tortured or forced to leave the country "because of the views they held, the ideas they expressed." The government banned books, periodicals and movies it deemed offensive, she continued. The press was censored heavily, and outside cultural influences, from places such as the United States and Great Britain, were shut out of the media. Marshall described how her copy of the London Times arrived with articles cut out with a pair of scissors by government censors. To bring the acts before the court would have been useless, she explained, as the courts were charged with upholding any laws enacted by the government, no matter how oppressive.
"There was no bill of rights against which such statutes could be assessed independently by judges and be struck down if they violated fundamental guarantees of human freedom."
Because of this experience, Marshall said, she has "an immigrant’s consciousness of the value of the constitutional guarantee of equality that can be enforced by an independent judiciary."
While her speech focused on social change brought about through the courts, Marshall emphasized that there are countless other ways to create change.
"There are hundreds of examples of people and institutions quietly working for the common good everywhere you look," she said, using Clark as an example. "How easy it would have been for Clark, with its influence and resources, its long commitment to teaching and research, to turn its back on the larger Worcester community. Instead, you have extended your hand in partnership."
Marshall urged the graduates to also extend their hands in partnership and embrace what she described as this country’s "great heritage of social justice." While the problems are large, she said, one person can make a difference. This, she said, is the real legacy of Quock Walker, Linda Brown and Donna Newman.
"They knew that what mattered was not to be discouraged, but to know that a small act, a single gesture, can make a difference on the long road to human freedom, and it will make a difference, often in ways you could never have imagined."
Also receiving honorary degrees were Saul Cohen, university professor emeritus of City University of New York and former graduate dean and director of the Graduate School of Geography at Clark who is an internationally recognized geographer; Annette Rafferty, founder of Abby’s House in Worcester, which provides emergency shelter, permanent housing and educational and other services for homeless and battered women; Roberta Sigel Ph.D. ’50, professor of political science emeritus at Rutgers University who continues to pursue groundbreaking research in the area of gender relations and politics; and Edward Zigler, Sterling Professor of Psychology Emeritus at Yale University who is known as the "father" of Head Start and the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993. Cohen, Rafferty and Sigel received honorary doctor of humane letters degrees. Zigler received an honorary doctor of science degree.
The other honorary degree recipients addressed the Honors Convocation, held on the morning of Commencement. The following are excerpts from their remarks.
Saul Cohen "Within the context of nationwide educational ferment, Clark University students, professors and administrators are indeed priviledged…This is an environment that invites stimulating programmatic innovations and intellectual excitement. It remains a very rare and very special institution of higher learning…I wish you, graduates, much success and good luck. You’re entering a world of considerable turmoil and uncertainty, and we count on what you have learned here, and on your moral strength, and on your energy to help move this world in the right direction."
Annette Rafferty "Personally, I am and always have been impressed with the encouragement given and the opportunities offered by Clark University to its students to get involved in the community. You’ve looked around, you’ve seen what needs to be done in Worcester, and you’ve pitched in…The world has grown better here because of you. So, my words to you are: Don’t stop now…We need you to continue. We need your presence in the public forum. We need to hear your voices speaking truth to power. We need you to question social policy that institutionalizes such things as homelessness."
Roberta Sigel Ph.D. ’50 "I believe few graduates can say as I can say quite honestly that had it not been for Clark, my life probably would have taken a very different path, both academically and privately…To me [the History Department faculty] became a lifelong example of what a scholar should be—not that I’ve always lived up to that example… When I chose a topic that was more political science than history for my dissertation, they did not object but genuinely supported my choice. And so now, I’m a political scientist, something I would not have become had it not been for Clark. Privately, my life also took a new turn at Clark, for it was here that I met my husband, who was at that time the student who led the protest against admitting women to Clark. I hope he’s changed his mind."
Edward Zigler "My time spent at Clark changed the entire trajectory of my life. Under Professor Bibace’s and Kaplan’s tuteledge and under the leadership of the world-renowned Heinz Werner, I became a committed cognitive developmentalist, which led to my work with children and with Head Start and beyond…I can truthfully say that Clark University built the foundation of knowledge upon which I’ve built my life. And I hope this will be true for all of you graduates, when you are ancient like me and look back at your days here at Clark and Worcester. With you, on this special day in our lives, I would like to thank all the educators of this great University for what it has done for us and what it has enabled us to do for others."
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Clarknews Summer 2004
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| Commencement speaker, Chief Justice Margaret Marshall |
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