January 1951 was a busy time for Japan, or more specifically, a busy time for the office of the Supreme Commander of Allied Forces Gen. Douglas MacArthur. General headquarters or GHQ, as it was commonly called, was getting ready to host the influential American diplomat John Foster Dulles, who was preparing the draft for the future Allied Treaty of Peace with Japan on behalf of the U.S. government, for his second trip to Japan.
But another important visitor had come just before then. Not yet as famous as Dulles at this point, he would nevertheless play a very important role in the 20th century, albeit in a different field. The visitor was Thurgood Marshall, one of the leading civil rights activists and lawyers in the United States and someone destined to become the first African-American Supreme Court justice.
He called his January 1951 trip to Japan “the most important mission thus far of my career.” Then 42 years old, he had already spent the previous two decades practicing law and arguing civil rights cases.