Judge Murnaghan was born in Baltimore on June 20, 1920.  As a child he was enamored with his uncle James Murnaghan, a Supreme Court Justice in Ireland to whom he attributed his love of law and Irish art.  Murnaghan was the son of the late Francis D. Murnaghan, Sr., a mathematician professor and Chair of the Mathematics Department at Johns Hopkins University.  The younger Murnaghan received his high school diploma from Baltimore City College and his undergraduate degree from Johns Hopkins University, where he was a member of both Phi Beta Kappa and the university’s national champion lacrosse team.  After graduating from Johns Hopkins in 1941, Murnaghan ventured to Washington, D.C., to work as an intelligence officer deciphering Japanese codes for the United States Navy. 

In 1945, at the conclusion of World War II, Murnaghan decided to pursue a career in the legal profession.  Judge Murnaghan received his degree from Harvard University School of Law in 1948, where he excelled academically, and he was a member of the Harvard Law Review.

After briefly practicing law in Philadelphia, Murnaghan served as general counsel to the U.S. High Council of Germany in Frankfurt from 1950-1952, where he worked to break up Germany’s industrial power structure at the I.G. Farben chemical works.  In 1952, he returned to Maryland and joined Venable, Baetjer and Howard, one of Baltimore city’s most preeminent law firms.  That same year, the firm granted him leave to serve as an assistant attorney general for Maryland.  Beginning in 1954, Murnaghan devoted himself to the full-time private practice of law at Venable, where his law practice consisted mainly of civil litigation.  Murnaghan regularly represented Baltimore City’s newspaper The Sun in libel and First Amendment cases.  He became a partner at Venable in 1957 and distinguished himself as a gifted trial and appellate litigator who argued numerous cases in the appellate courts of this country, including the Supreme Court of the United States.

Judge Murnaghan was an early proponent for equality in matters of race and gender.  In the 1960s, he defended civil rights activists who tried to integrate the Gwynn Oak amusement park in Baltimore County.  In 1967, Judge Murnaghan ran for mayor on a ticket that included black and Jewish candidates.  His support for those causes existed at a time in American history when diversity was not yet the norm.

A person of ecumenical pursuits, Judge Murnaghan’s life embodied the highest standards of civic duty and good citizenship.  He also served in a wide variety of community activities, including Trustee for Johns Hopkins University, President of the School Board for the City of Baltimore, he was Chairman of the Walters Art Museum, and he was closely affiliated with the Peabody Institute, where he served on the Board of Directors.  In these capacities, and others, Judge Murnaghan left an unmistakable and indelible mark on his community.

Judge Murnaghan remained at Venable until 1979, when President Jimmy Carter nominated him to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, a federal court which handles appeals from federal district courts in Maryland, West Virginia, Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina.  His nomination was hailed throughout the Baltimore community.  Baltimore’s leading newspaper, The Sun, stated that “Frank Murnaghan is acknowledged by judges and fellow lawyers alike as the foremost of this generation at the bar and is among the finest two or three lawyers Maryland has lately produced.”

As a member of the court that Judge Murnaghan described as “sort of a pinnacle of a lawyer’s career,” he quickly gained the respect of his colleagues on the bench, as well as those who argued before him.  Judge Murnaghan was known for dominating oral arguments, asking difficult questions, posing one hypothetical after another, and then rendering a thoughtful opinion.  He remained an active, full-time member of the Court until his death on August 31, 2000. 

Judge Murnaghan’s devotion to core democratic freedoms was unwavering.  He authored important opinions, and milestone dissents, in the areas of First Amendment, labor, criminal procedure, and civil rights law.  Through these decisions, he created opportunities to improve public schools, to eliminate racial prejudices, and to better the fabric of our democracy.  Indeed, Senator Paul Sarbanes described Judge Murnaghan, a man who “underst[ood] the fundamental role of the law in our society and its significance to the individual.” 

Like his predecessors, Judge Murnaghan brought to the court an exceptional blend of powerful intellect, broad prior experiences and erudition in law, and high, unyielding professionalism.  Judge Murnaghan was a man of “iron will” who championed the protection of constitutional rights and who deeply believed that the First Amendment was a pillar of our democracy.  In addition to being recognized as one of our country’s leading jurist, he was well respected for displaying compassion to criminal defendants, the poor, and the voiceless.  This fellowship, named in his honor, stands as a monument to a towering legal figure who the Baltimore Sun aptly characterized in an editorial as a man who used the law “to realize the American people’s constitutional freedoms.”