Florida Historical Markers Programs - Marker Detail

Description: Lawson Edward (L.E.) Thomas (1898-1989) was born in Ocala. He attended Florida A&M College, and later the University of Michigan Law School. He moved to Miami in 1935, and made his first appearance in municipal court in 1937. As the first black attorney in Miami to present a case at trial, the bailiffs forced him to sit at the rear of the courtroom when he arrived to represent his client. Thomas refused, and instead left the courtroom until the judge was at the bench before returning to present the case. During the 1940s, Thomas was involved in multiple groundbreaking civil rights lawsuits. He fought for salary equalization for black teachers in Marion and Lake counties. Thomas led a protest in 1945 over the barring of African Americans from area beaches, which led to the creation of an all-black park on Virginia Key Beach. He also represented black defendants on behalf of the NAACP. In 1950, Thomas was appointed the first judge of the newly-created Negro Municipal Court in Miami, becoming the city’s first black judge, and the first in the South since Reconstruction. After his term, Thomas began his law practice in this office in the late 1950s, and served the Overtown community for nearly 30 years.