The first African American Louisiana justice died Sunday in Baton Rouge, at the age of 84. Revius Ortique Jr. was a civil rights attorney who became the first black justice on the Louisiana Supreme Court.

According to The Associated Press, current Justice Kitty Kimbal said that Ortique suffered a stroke on June 14 and he died because of some complications related to the stroke. Ortique’s home from New Orleans was destroyed in the Katrina Hurricane and he and his wife moved to Louisiana’s capital.

Kimbal also said that he admired Ortique and was very lucky she managed to work with him. She came in Ortique’s place in 1992, when the judge retired, as he turned 70.

“I never knew anyone who did not like him. He exemplified the word gentleman,” Kimbal told The Associated Press.

When he was a civil rights attorney in the 1950s and 1960s he worked hard to integrate labor unions and also represented black workers, helping them to get paid equally, as the rest of the workers. In 1959 Ortique was elected president of the National Bar Association. He served three terms as president of the Community Relations Council, in New Orleans.

He lobbied President Lyndon Johnson to name black judges in the Supreme Court. Later, Johnson nominated Thurgood Marshall, who was the first black judge on the U.S. Supreme Court.

Criminal Court Judge Arthur Hunter said that Ortique has inspired many lawyers and judges. “Not just African-American lawyers and judges, but all lawyers and judges,” added Huner.

He was survived by Miriam Marie Victorianne Ortique, his wife, Rhesa Marie McDonald, his daughter and three grandchildren.