This study examined the life of Benjamin Elijah Mays , in terms of discerning his character strengths and the role they played in addressing equality issues during his lifetime and beyond. Character was defined by the analytic framework of Peterson and Seligman’s Character Strengths and Virtues: A Handbook and Classification . An examination of Mays’s written archived works as well as key secondary references served as data sources. Peterson and Seligman’s Values In Action-Inventory of Strengths