Opinion
More evidence of Sotomayor's racialist jurisprudence
Examiner Editorial
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June 8, 2009
As we said in our first comment in this space on President Obama’s nomination of federal Appeals Court Judge Sonia Sotomayor to succeed retiring Justice David Souter on the U.S Supreme Court, her personal story is compelling, but her jurisprudence is racially and ethnocentrically grounded. This is a sad fact for a woman of such obvious intelligence and experience, but it is nevertheless a fact. The evidence for the accuracy of this assessment increased last week when Sotomayor delivered a 172-page response to the Senate’s questionnaire regarding her qualifications and fitness to serve on the nation’s highest court. The document undercut theWhite House claim that her 2001 Berkley speech saying “a wise Latina woman” would rule better than “a white male” was merely an isolated instance of poor word choice.
The reality is that Sotomayor has often spoken of the superiority of ethnicity (and gender) as determinants of what she deems to be sound judicial rulings. As Slate reported, Sotomayor said in a 1994 speech that she "would hope that a wise woman with the richness of her experience would, more often than not, reach a better conclusion. What is better? I … hope that better will mean a more compassionate and caring conclusion." Similarly, the Associated Press reported that Sotomayor “said it almost precisely the same way in speeches to the Princeton Club in 2002 and one at Seton Hall law school in 2003, according to copies she sent the Senate.” Further, The Washington Post said “in a 1999 speech to the Women's Bar Association of New York State, Sotomayor invoked ‘sister power,’ called for the selection of a third woman Supreme Court justice -- which she would now be -- and used phrasing similar to that in the Berkeley speech. ‘I would hope that a wise woman with the richness of her experiences would, more often than not, reach a better conclusion.’"
White House aides are now trying to portray these statements as a mere handful of quotes that don’t represent an accurate picture of Sotomayor’s jurisprudence. But the reality is that these latest instances, stretching over a period of more than a decade, clearly demonstrate that Sotomayor places greater importance on ethnicity, gender and life experiences than she does the Constitution, with its uncompromising requirement that all citizens receive the equal protection of the law. Since Sotomayor cannot now credibly renounce her oft-expressed view on this critical issue, there is no honorable alternative to withdrawing her nomination.
