Sonia Sotomayor is reportedly Barack Obama’s first nomination to the Supreme Court. If confirmed, she would be the first Hispanic person to serve as a Supreme Court justice.
Sonia Sotomayor was born on June 25, 1954 in New York City. She was raised in the South Bronx by working class parents and is of Puerto Rican descent.
Despite her working class background, she attended Princeton University and graduated summa cum laude in 1976. With her stellar credentials, she had her pick of law schools to attend and chose to go to Yale Law School, where she was an editor of the Yale Law Journal. Upon graduation in 1979, she worked as an Assistant District Attorney in New York County. Then, she moved on to private practice, working several years for the law firm Pavia & Harcourt. She married while at Princeton, but divorced in 1983.
In 1991, Sotomayor was nominated by President George H. W. Bush to a seat on the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. She was the first Hispanic federal judge in New York. She was confirmed by the Senate in 1992.
In 1997, she was nominated by President Bill Clinton to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, and confirmed by the Senate in 1998.
For much of her career, she was considered a moderate, hence her appointments by both a Republican and Democratic President. Today, conservatives tend to view her as a judicial activist and a liberal.
For months, she has been named by numerous media outlets, including CNN and Esquire Magazine, as a virtual shoe-in for nomination to the Supreme Court with the retirement of David Souter and the likely retirement of several aging Supreme Court justices (John Paul Stevens, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and possibly others).
Sotomayor’s appointment seems to make sense for Barack Obama. She would be a liberal, pro-choice justice who would maintain the judicial majority that opposes the overturning of Roe v. Wade. Further, by nominating a Hispanic woman, Obama would potentially gain standing within the Hispanic communities.
Since Obama will likely appoint two if not three Supreme Court justices over the next four years, and has a substantial Democratic majority in the Senate to confirm them, conservatives hoping to overturn Roe v. Wade likely have a VERY LONG wait ahead of them.
Watch the following video on what Obama believes about Supreme Court appointments:
Obama on Supreme Court Appointments - Video
November 23rd, 2008 at 1:02 pm
[...] Sotomayor was born on June 25, 1954 in The Bronx, New York, so her age is 54. She was born of Puerto Rican decent and [...]
January 29th, 2009 at 6:42 pm
[...] Sonia Sotomayor: Obama’s First Supreme Court Appointment? [Right Pundits] Potential Justices: Sonia Sotomayor [National Journal] Sonia Sotomayor [Esquire] [...]
May 1st, 2009 at 10:14 am
[...] of the Supreme Court. As reported by multiple news sources, his first appointment will likely be Sonia Sotomayor. As a moderate liberal woman of Latina descent who has impeccable credentials, Sotomayor seems to [...]
May 1st, 2009 at 9:55 pm
The house plays no role in the confirmation process. The president’s nomination only requires the “advice and consent” of the senate.
May 2nd, 2009 at 1:11 pm
jester, comment noted and correction made.
May 26th, 2009 at 4:41 am
The job of the supreme court is not to make laws but to interpret them. The problem with Roe v. Wade is that there was not then and still is no legal precedent for the decision and so it should either be be enacted into law by congress or overturned. It is truly unfortunate that the country has chosen to circumvent the system of checks and balances this way. Elections of presidents should not be based on defending an illegitimate legal decision but on appointing justices who will uphold and defend the constitution and interpret the law.
I hope Mr. Obama remembers that he too took an oath of office and that his selection of a justice to deliberately usurp the constitution is essentially an act of treason.
This misuse of the judicial system has to stop as it jeopardize all of our fundamental rights as Americans. If you are unhappy with Roe v. Wade then vote for congressional representatives who have the moral backbone to write new law but do not pressure a liberal president to appoint liberal justices in order to get what you want out of the system as this is not the prescribed way we are supposed to do things in America. And if you can’t understand this message you should go back to school before you cast your next vote.
May 26th, 2009 at 4:53 am
Katwoman….you’re Awesome!
May 26th, 2009 at 5:20 am
katwoman is 100% on the mark! Obama should be tried for treason and impeached & jailed when found guilty.
Not to mention for fraud as well, as he still won’t release his real, original birth certificate.
May 26th, 2009 at 10:05 am
[...] is both a liberal and a catholic and many will be wondering in the weeks ahead just what kind of Associate Justice she would be on the Supreme Court. And for conservatives like myself, the issue of abortion and how [...]
May 26th, 2009 at 10:50 am
[...] aside her judicial temperment and practices and whether they are appropriate for the Supreme Court, it is clear that Barack Obama’s [...]
August 1st, 2009 at 9:23 pm
Reference (Scrap5000)katwoman is 100% on the mark! Obama should be tried for treason and impeached & jailed when found guilty.
Not to mention for fraud as well, as he still won’t release his real,original birth certificate.
Have you lost your mind? Look at Sotomayor’s record she would be a great ally. Hell we are in a protracted war in Iraq and Afghanistan under false pretenses and you want to impeach Obama for not fraud over his birth records.
Scrap5000 is part of the right wing conspiracy that pushes war and selling drugs in America to finance wars against our enemies that our elected officials refused to finance by a vote!
If you dislike Obama so much then you should be mad at GW Bush and the idiots in his cabinet. As a Republican even I know that GW’s incompetence put Obama is in the White House! Clean up your act and find solutions to problems and stop pointing fingers…
August 8th, 2009 at 12:10 pm
[...] Sonia SotoMayor as a supreme court justice was a significant action showing his real intentions: Sonia Sotomayor: Obama’s First Supreme Court Appointment Right Pundits Not even Bush was talking about the total abolition of abortion because as you say its what [...]
September 17th, 2009 at 4:19 pm
Still Sober & Republican: Who said Bush was any better? Why do you idiots always bring up Bush whenever someone points out Obama is untrustworthy?? Separate the two…Obama is a fraud, and Bush sucked. Wake up, sheeple!