A civil rights leader in Maryland who also served in the General Assembly for 20 years, has died at age 81.

The successor to the Rev.  Emmett C. Burns Jr. in the legislature told The Baltimore Sun that Burns died Thursday at a local hospital from complications of a fall.

The newspaper says Burns was the first African American elected to statewide government office from Baltimore County when he joined the House of Delegates in  the mid-1990s.

Burns led a successful campaign to name the Baltimore/Washington International Airport for Thurgood Marshall while a legislator.

He held NAACP leadership positions in Mississippi and the mid-Atlantic region.