License to Thrive

"Hispanic History"

Sonia Sotomayor was sworn in as the newest Supreme Court judge  at a televisied event at the Supreme Court in Washington.  Sotomayor became the First Hispanic and only the third female supreme court judge in the court's 220-year history. 

Earlier in the day, she was sworn in during an off-camera ceremony. Her mother, Celina, and Juan Luis Sotomayor, her brother, stood beside her during the administration of the public oath.  Sotomayor is the first supreme court judge to be appointed by President Barack Obama and is the second youngest of the nine court's members.

Earlier in the week, the US Senate confirmed Judge Sonial Sotomayor as the 111th justice of the Supreme Court. No Democrat voted against her, however, all but 9 of the 40 Republican senators did. 

Sotomayor, who is Puerto Rican and was raised in a Bronx housing project, would become the nation’s first Hispanic Supreme Court justice.  Judge Sotomayor is Mr. Obama’s first selection to the Supreme Court and she would be the third woman to serve on the Court.  She would replace Justice David Souter who is retiring. 

Judge Sotomayor, 54, has served for more than a decade on the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, based in New York City.  She is a graduate of Princeton University and Yale Law School where she was editor of the Yale Law Journal.   The first President Bush nominated her in 1991 to the federal district court and President Clinton chose  to elevate her to the appeals court in 1997.  She was confirmed a year later.  In 1995, as a district judge, she earned notoriety by ending a Major League Baseball strike, ruling in favor of players against the owners.  Critics have recently raised issues with some of the comments she has made in the past, calling the comments racist.  They also cite a recent Supreme Court case which rules in favor of White fire fighters in New haven who stated they were discriminated against when the city through out test scores for a promotion exam because no Black firefighters had passed the test.  Sotomayor had refused to hear the case when an appeal came before her as a federal judge.