To be remembered means to have lived a life that didn’t stop at your death.

Rather, it lived on when your presence was no longer in the room. It shaped people in ways that carry on quietly yet unmistakably in how they think, move and stand up for what matters. It means to become part of a place and not just pass through it.

And when a life has done that, remembering it in its entirety is not a task one can do alone.

Which is why on Monday, March 23, on the steps of Sumter Judicial Center nestled on Harvin Street, hundreds from corners here, there and everywhere across South Carolina gathered to honor a life and all that it had built. On what would’ve been the 95th birthday of S.C. Supreme Court Judge Ernest A. Finney Jr., attendees witnessed the unveiling of a statue that stands in his likeness.

A reflection of who he was and a guide to what one could become.

Long before he became the first African-American chief justice of South Carolina Supreme Court since Reconstruction, Finney, a native of Virginia, was a young attorney working in a system that did not always reflect the justice it claimed to uphold. In the 1960s, he represented those arrested during sit-ins, Freedom Rides and civil rights demonstrations. Notably, the Friendship Nine, a group of African-American students from Friendship Junior College who went to jail after staging a sit-in at a segregated McCrory’s lunch counter in Rock Hill in 1961.

He defended them in courtrooms where the outcomes were often decided before arguments were ever made.

But, for Finney, many didn’t stay that way.

His appeals would turn decisions, his persistence would shift outcomes. In 2015, Judge John C. Hayes III, the nephew of the original judge who sentenced the Friendship Nine to 30 days in jail at York County chain-gang, overturned the convictions of the nine, with Finney as their attorney.

Over time, piece by piece, the same system that resisted change began to move closer to the justice it promised.

The belief that the law could and should serve all people carried Finney forward. From South Carolina courtrooms to South Carolina House of Representatives, where he became one of the first Black members of the House Judiciary Committee in modern times. From there to the bench as a circuit court judge in 1976 to the state’s highest court in 1985 and in 1994 to the first Black supreme court chief justice in South Carolina.

But on those days, the titles were only as good as the people who entrusted him with them. The people who knew him beyond the courtroom, who learned from him, worked beside him and carried his influence into their lives, both professionally and personally.

Among those who stood in the wake of his influence was retired South Carolina Supreme Court Chief Justice Jean Toal. She knew Finney Jr. not just as a figure in history, but as a colleague in the House of Representatives. Someone who during the time when the state’s legal landscape was defined by separation, opportunities were limited by design and access was not easily or evenly granted, Finney Jr. still found his footing. From a revered representative calling for reform to a historical chief justice to the first Black circuit court judge in Sumter County, his vision remained grounded, his voice “was a voice of clarity” and because of that, the path forward widened for those who would follow.

That voice would share stories that when told years removed from its origins, it still carried reverence. James Felder, former representative for House of Representatives-one of four Black men to be elected to South Carolina House of Representatives since Reconstruction in 1970, recalled Finney Jr. as the young attorney in Conway, teaching school and waiting tables before coming to Sumter to take over a law practice. The early days were not easy, but the defining moments never are. It is in Sumter that Finney Jr.’s work and the importance of connecting with the community were shaped. It’s where he could be found to make strides in ways he couldn’t imagine but others trusted him to, from being Sumter’s circuit court judge to putting South Carolina State back on track as its president. As a “quick study,” Felder said, he not only understood the law but how to move within the systems around it.

That sense of becoming who the community and its constituents needed was deeply tied to the civil rights movement. Jim McCain, chairman for Sumter County Council and son of the late Congress of Racial Equality Director James “Nooker” McCain, spoke of the shared history between the Finney and McCain families. How Finney’s fight for equality was as urgent as it was personal. He spoke of how his father’s urgency to drive from Rock Hill to Sumter in search of Finney Jr. to defend the Friendship Nine was matched by Finney Jr.’s willingness to show up when it mattered most.

But where many speakers, also include South Carolina Speaker of the House Murrell Smith, Rep. David Weeks, University of South Carolina Director of the Center for Civil Rights History and Research Bobby Donaldson and former Rep. Larry Blanding, spoke from a vantage point of impact, Frances Davenport Finney spoke of the place that became home.

She recalled their move to “sweet Sumter” in 1962, arriving with two babies in her arms and an excitement to build a life that would grow alongside the community that now gathered in his honor. It was the warmth in how she spoke, her glee in how she sang her late husband “Happy Birthday” and the radiant yellow she wore against the setting sun that made one thing clear: the legacy of Finney Jr. still lived in all he came in contact with. That in all the historic milestones and all the everyday moments-from the lessons of law he instilled in his children at home, even if they didn’t seem to believe in them, to moments that even brought him to tears, like that at his installation as chief justice where a poem authored by his daughter, Nikky, reflected though he never had it made, “here you are making it – Finney Jr. was a force. It was in the way he moved, in the way he loved and in the way his presence left people better than how it found them.

“While no monument can fully capture the man he was, this statue ensures that his legacy of integrity, wisdom and unwavering commitment to justice will endure for generations,” she shared.

The statute, as the vision of The Goodfellows of Sumter, a century-old civic organization of “good men,” from community leaders to elected officials to lawyers and every pivotal and influential figure in between, was not only to reflect Finney Jr.’s accomplishments but to recognize the lasting impact of his work. That his presence, etched in bronze, should serve future generations as a visible lesson in history, integrity and public service.

“He is basically the son of Sumter. To know that, in his own terms, the law works. That if you persevere, if you keep holding out for what’s right, if you keep holding out for what’s just, it will eventually come to fruition. This is a perfect example,” said the Rev. James Williams, vice president of Goodfellows and chair of statute committee, as he gestured to Finney Jr. “We need to be reminded not to give up, not to give in. Don’t turn your back on it. Keep fighting and be strong.”

As the ceremony reached its conclusion, the focus shifted from what had been revealed to what was now expected.

“Are you living in such a way that someone would want to double your spirit?” Williams asked the crowd.

It’s a question that’s meant to linger. To encourage reflection and action. Because to be remembered by the way Finney Jr. is remembered in Sumter, revered in South Carolina and recognized across the nation is to have done more than live.

It’s to have left behind a legacy that still calls people, moves them to seek opportunities that though lacking in equity are still available to them. It doesn’t matter if you’re prepared, only that you’re called because those called to break barriers made it possible for others to continue the work

–The Sumter Item