[1][2] She obtained a role with the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund as a staff attorney in 1946 after receiving her law degree, and continued her work with the organization for more than twenty years.

Although she had already formed a desire to practice law, Motley lacked the means to attend college, and instead went to work for the National Youth Administration.

Through this work she encountered local businessman and philanthropist Clarence W. Blakeslee, who, after hearing Motley speak at a New Haven community center, offered to pay for her education.

[14] After graduating from Columbia's Law School in 1946, she was hired by the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund (LDF) as a civil rights lawyer.

Martin Luther King Jr. while he sat in jail, as well as spent a night with civil rights activist Medgar Evers under armed guard.

She was otherwise a key legal strategist in the civil rights movement, helping to desegregate Southern schools, buses, and lunch counters.

In 1964, she was elected to the New York State Senate and devoted much of her time to advocate for housing equality for majority-Black and Latino, low-income tenants.

[15] Despite opposition, she was confirmed by the United States Senate on August 30, 1966, and received her commission the same day, becoming the first African American female federal judge.

1970)., another highly publicized case, Motley admonished the New York City police for not providing Vietnam war protesters with adequate protection against violence in the streets.

This case involved female tenants in New York City arguing that their male landlord was violating their First and Fourteenth Amendment rights.

Motley ruled in favor of the defendant, rejecting the plaintiffs' claim of sex discrimination and going against her former advocacy for tenants during her time in the New York State Senate.

[25] In Ludtke v. Kuhn, Melissa Ludtke filed a lawsuit against Bowie Kuhn, the Major League Baseball Commissioner, The American League President Leland MacPhail, and three New York City officials over the New York Yankees gendered policy forbidding female sports reporters from entering the Yankees locker room.

[34] Constance Baker married Joel Motley Jr., a real estate and insurance broker, in 1946 at Saint Luke's Episcopal Church in New Haven, Connecticut.

[34][35] Baker and Motley were married for 59 years, until her death of congestive heart failure on September 28, 2005, fourteen days after her 84th birthday, at NYU Downtown Hospital in New York City.

During her time as a federal judge for the Southern District of New York, Motley made efforts to reach out to other African-American women in her position.

[37] In 2005, the University of Pennsylvania Law School's American Constitution Society (ACS) student chapter began to host National Writing Competitions annually in honor of Constance Baker Motley.

[39] Judith Heumann, co-founder of the World Institute on Disability, credits Motley with her becoming the first licensed teacher in the state of New York who used a wheelchair.

[40] U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris explicitly cites Motley's influence on her own political and law career on her campaign page.

[41] Federal Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson cited Motley as an influence on her own career in a speech accepting President Joe Biden's nomination to become an associate justice of the Supreme Court.

[42] An award-winning biographical documentary, Justice is a Black Woman: The Life and Work of Constance Baker Motley, was broadcast on Connecticut Public Television in 2012.

The first day of issue ceremony took place at the Constance Baker Motley Recreation Center in New York City and was presided over by the Honorable Anton Hajjar, member of the U.S.