SCOTUS Pick Sotomayor and the 2nd Amendment

[BarbC]

In trying to determine Judge Sotomayor's stand on the Second Amendment, I found only this:

Link

[mstuhr]

Hi Barb,
No one that gets nominated can disapoint me. I expect the worst.
If we happen to get anything better than the worst I will be pleased.
Thanks for the info.
Mike

[Spotteddog]

If he gets re-elected, you'll have a Hell of a lot more to worry about than his SCOTUS nominee's? Those future picks will be the least of gun owners worries!

[luangtom]

This woman is frightening. She is on record as stating that the US Constitution is outdated and is irrelevant and that judges make policy. She also is on record as stating, "Latinos are smarter than White men". How can anyone publicly making these statement be unbiased and sit on the bench of SCOTUS and make decisions clearly? Scary to think that this is just the beginning....

[wheelgun1958]

She's also made racial statements.

“I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn’t lived that life,”

Who's next on her list of those she feels superior to? Jews? Gypsies?

Also a video has surfaced of Judge Sotomayor asserting in 2005 that a “court of appeals is where policy is made.” She then immediately adds: “And I know — I know this is on tape, and I should never say that because we don’t make law. I know. O.K. I know. I’m not promoting it. I’m not advocating it. I’m — you know.”

Judges make policy and decide who are the undesirables. Hmmmm. Familiar?

[Spotteddog]

I'm sure it's all coincidence? You know, announcing the appointment 24 hours after Kim Jung Makesmeill lights off nuke #2? Watch BOTH hands!
(EDIT) But on the other hand there are 2 saving graces in this.
1. She's replacing an already left leaning justice.
And,
2. Mathematically she's impossible to prevent? So she'll be all theirs, just like the swindleus package was!

[R. Walter]

In picking Sotomayor Obama has almost certainly solidified his standing among Hispanics. If Republicans can't find a way to make Hispanics a swing group electorally -- as Bush did in 2004 when he won 44 percent of the Latino vote -- they may find themselves in a permanent minority status. Bridging that gap between the GOP and the Hispanic community just got a lot more difficult.

There is a direct link between Obama's election and his first SCOTUS pick, a series of firsts that reaffirm the idea that anyone born in this country can grow up to be anything they can achieve.

The Sotomayor selection is a sign that Obama knows he is riding high in terms of personal popularity and job approval and isn't afraid to pick someone that will enrage the conservative right. Obama knows his selection of Sotomayor will create a reaction on the right and possibly lead to a more contentious hearing in the Senate Judiciary Committee and vote on the floor of the Senate than some of the other names that have been bounced around.

The simple fact is this is a fight Obama welcomes because of the current political environment. Obama is not only popular but also trusted by the American people.

Republicans, on the other hand, have staggered around leaderless since the 2008 election. They seem to watch helplessly as the unpopular former VP Cheney has stepped into the void.

Republicans will, almost certainly, use the Sotomayor pick as a rallying cry for their party which is in shambles. But, in picking Sotomayor, Obama has expressed his absolute confidence that even a united GOP can't beat him.

[luangtom]

Yer probably correct about the solidifying of the Hispanic community on this appointment. Most, if any, never owned firearms in Puerto Rico or Mexico or wherever they are from. So, the 2A is not on their priority-list. I know in my contacts with members of my daughter-in-law's family the 2A is not a priority. The "programs" are. Guess what Obama has promised?.....More "programs".

[ChadW]

After hearing about her race and gender driven rulings, as well as hearing some statements she has made, I decided to write to my PA senators. Both dems now that Specter switched.

The Senate has to confirm the nomination, so if you feel uneasy about this choice, I recommend contacting your senators.

Letter:

Dear Senator Specter,

The purpose of this email is to address nomination of Sonia Sotomayor for the Supreme Court. The fact that she would be "the first Hispanic and the third woman to serve on the high court" is, in my opinion, not a factor to consider when choosing a Supreme Court Justice.
Questions about her personal bias based on gender and ethnicity have already been raised. Ricci v. DeStefano is a prime example of questionable judgment. In the aforementioned case, Judge Sotomayor was part of a panel ruling against a group of white firefighters in New Haven, Connecticut. The firefighters objected after the city threw out the results of a promotion test because too many white firefighters, and not enough minority firefighters, scored high. To me, this is a troubling ruling that clearly favors race instead of ability as a deciding factor for promotion.
Statements made by the Judge in the past are also concerning. When speaking at Duke University, she once said "All of the legal defense funds out there, they're looking for people with court of appeals experience" because "the court of appeals is where policy is made." This comment greatly concerns me because the purpose of the judicial branch has never been to make policy, but to interpret the law.
I personally do not wish to see Judge Sotomayor appointed the Supreme Court, and I ask you to take a close look into her past during the confirmation before deciding how to vote.

Thank you for your time.

Respectfully,

Chad Willis

[uzisandfloozies]

if you substitute "1st amendment" anywhere a lunatic liberal says "2nd amendment", it gets interesting.

would this gas-bag say that 1st amendment rights are not protected at the state level? are the states free to prohibit free speech, free worship, etc?

how about civil rights? are the states free to violate federal civil rights statutes? sems to me that was the whole point of the civil rights movement - to make the states obey the constitutionally-protected rights of ALL citizens...

[The Rabbi]

This woman is frightening. She is on record as stating that the US Constitution is outdated and is irrelevant and that judges make policy.

Can you post where she said such a thing. Of course she is a liberal. Did anyone expect something different? She will be replacing a liberal. No loss there.
I so far haven't seen anything in the record that makes me want to take to the streets.

[luangtom]

It was read on the Newsmax web-site under Breaking News. I have e-mailed it to you via the address on your profile.

[The Rabbi]

I didnt see any place where she says the Constitution is outdated.
Nor did I see any place where she said a Hispanic woman would decide cases better than a white man.
Nor did I see where she advocated making legislation from the bench. Actually the opposite of that.
I do see people struggling to take any comments she made out of context.

[USAF385]

You can check any news site and find the quote of her saying "I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life."

YouTube has the video of her saying the court of is where policy is made... but she also immediately said something along the lines of.. I shouldn't have said that in front of the cameras, and we all know policy isn't made here... (something along those lines)

I've known about her for..... well since today so I really have no opinion. The firefighter thing really bugs me though. That I really don't like.

[7.62foryou]

ChadW You think I should write to my Senators? Thses two #$%^& voted to close Gitmo and bring the scum there here. I'm going to talk to my dogs about it instead.

[ChadW]

Originally posted by 7.62foryou:
ChadW You think I should write to my Senators? Thses two #$%^& voted to close Gitmo and bring the scum there here. I'm going to talk to my dogs about it instead.

I understand your cynicism. Complainging to forum members and your dogs will not accomplish anything though. My two Senators are Arlen Specter and Robert Casey.... do you think I think I will change their minds? I just want them to know that there are people out there who are wary of Sotomayor... Especially Specter. He's on thin ice for his little switch to the Dems not too long ago and he should know there isn't total support for her.

[badguybuster]

She is also the judge who threw out the case where the white firefighters were sueing over reverse discrimination. Her brief was one paragraph long! From what I gathered watching Lou Dobbs (only one on CNN I can stomach) the other Dem Judges aren't too fond of her either.

[godlessgael]

I think Obama has the same vetting staff as McCain did when he picked Palin. How could he ever seriously consider this lady??? She is on record making very serious racist statements. This is before we even take into consideration that she believes the courts are for making policy.

[The Rabbi]

Everyone keeps repeating the same sound bites heard on Rush Limbaugh. THey are out of context and do not support the conclusions drawn.
I'm certainly no fan of Obama but I haven't seen anything that suggests she is unqualified or even hostile to our point of view.
I would strongly suggest going and reading the entirety of the lecture that has been cited. Keep in mind the context of it. I think it is very good. I don't agree with her conclusions but it is fair, balanced and she comes across as very bright. And I don't find the quotation that has been attributed to her here.
Lecture found here

[ChadW]

Originally posted by The Rabbi:
Everyone keeps repeating the same sound bites heard on Rush Limbaugh.

First of all, I don't EVER listen to Rush. Guess where my news came from? FOX, CNN, ABC, CBS, and NBC.

Second, the firefighter issue isn't a "soundbite", it's a fact. One of the firefighters was interviewed and said he didn't get his promotion because he was white. He had tested better than some minorities, but since they decided to throw out the test results, they promoted LESS QUALIFIED people over him. Now that makes sense.

[Capt Steve]

To attack her as unqualified based upon a lack of experience is a fools mission that I'm sure Rush has already signed up for. You may not like her but the lady is eminently qualified for the job. Watch as all the bluster and talk of a filibuster disappears like a fart in the wind. Not many sitting Senators are going to be willing stick their political necks out opposing her confirmation. She will be easily confirmed.

I do hope both sides will take her to task for some of the alleged statements referenced above. Lets hear what she has to say about 2A, the first and 14th amendments. At this point in time I doubt either side of the argument really knows where she stands on many issues. As Ricky Ricardo would say: "You got a lot of splainin to do!"

[ChadW]

+1 Capt Steve

I think it's obvious she'll make it through. I WOULD like the see them.. not give her a hard time just to give her a hard time, but like you said, make her explain.

[The Rabbi]

She's been a federal judge since 1992 and an appeals court judge since '97. She is qualified, no doubt about it.
The New Haven case is a tough one. The basic law stinks, but that's what she had to work with. I might disagree with the outcome but I can see why a court would decide as it did.
She will get confirmed. This isn't the place to wage a war. Pick your battles carefully, goes the old advice.

[badguybuster]

That is the genius of her appt. for the annointed one it is a win-win. No matter what happens. If she gets appointed, he wins the hispanic and female vote, plus she will likely be a far lefter. If she loses (unlikely) he wins because all us nasty Conservatives plotted against her. So he still gets their vote. BUGGER!!!

[badguybuster]

Ya know. It is really annoying to keep hearing people say, "Pick your battles" or "next time we'll do this or that". Let me tell ya, the war is getting away from us. The country is getting farther and farther away from its roots. If you don't make yourself heard, then stay out of the damn way, so the rest of us can try get something done!

[The Rabbi]

The truth can be frustrating.
But unless the GOP wants to be a minority party forever they will let this one slip.
We ought to concentrate on defeating health care and cap-and-tax, and then rolling back the deficit. Those are real issues that are threatening the country.

[Smithfan]

The Sotomayor quote:

"I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion [as a judge] than a white male who hasn't lived that life."

Yessir! What is unspoken, of course, is the assumption that all us old white guys are trust fund kids.

Yup, I felt just like Teddy K. must have when I was growing up on the outskirts of Des Moines, on a dirt road. We had outdoor plumbing, but a deluxe 2-holer. Hell, we were among the neighborhood elite!

Sorry, folks, but "context of the speech" is nonsense. This woman is a racist, a sexist, and one who sees the Constitution as at best an inconvenience to her agenda, pure and simple. I have no doubt she will be confirmed to great acclaim, and probably will go on to do great damage to what is left of the Constitution.

Bill

[Spotteddog]

I'm beginning to think that this is a golden opportunity to kill two birds with one stone. If handled properly, it could be an opening to demonstrate what having the type of leadership the left would like the right to have, would actually look and act like!
Scenario #1. Would be solemn nodding of heads on our side in mute agreement with the nominee, and asking how she likes her coffee.
Scenario #2.? Would be, well see scenario #1.
Scenario #3 However, would be turning to the C-Span camera's and each in succession repeatedly saying "America, there's nothing we can do about this, due to you having elected a bullet proof majority of them in both houses".
Then voting "present" for confirmation.

[The Rabbi]

Sorry, folks, but "context of the speech" is nonsense

Not only is it not nonsense, it is critical. And I am still waiting for someone to point out where in the speech she says those exact words.

[ladder13]

Originally posted by ChadW:
Second, the firefighter issue isn't a "soundbite", it's a fact. One of the firefighters was interviewed and said he didn't get his promotion because he was white. He had tested better than some minorities, but since they decided to throw out the test results, they promoted LESS QUALIFIED people over him. Now that makes sense.

In fact, NONE of the FF's(white, black or other) has received a promotion since the civil service list was deemed "unacceptable" by the municipality. This is more of an injustice, as the supervisory ranks are woefully inadequate.

[The Rabbi]

It was "unacceptable" because it resulted in a racially-disparate result. Such a result is illegal per Federal statute.
I think that sucks. I think that's ridiculous. But that is the law and that is why she ruled like that.

Conclusion: Judge Sotomayor, regardless of her participation in ritualistic observances and rules of the Roman Church is a member of a cultural group which is opposed to the traditional American values of self-determination, individual initiative, and self-reliance

That's the most absurdly bigoted thing I've read on a gun board in a long time. And my comment doesn't even begin to address the factual errors of the post.

[Super38]

Although she would not be MY choice, she does seem to have the qualifications. She replaces another liberal judge so no surprise there. I think not much impact as far as the vote is concerned. Heller would still pass.

It's simply BO playing to his audience. If we're not careful, this is the sort of thing that will get him re-elected, no matter what he does to our country. THEN, your 2nd Amendment rights will disappear.

[The Rabbi]

It could have been really bad.
Imagine Eric Holder or Deval Patrick as the nominee. I was ready to place money that Patrick would be it.

[uzisandfloozies]

all during the campaign, one of the most vocal reasons for voting against BO was "supreme court picks". well, now we have it. another "living constitution" judge.

we get the government we deserve, by being so careless and thoughtless about our liberty and our rights. more people care about who won "american idol" than care about their liberty.

it should be an interesting next few years....

[The Rabbi]

I hope no one expected another Antonin Scalia. That just wasn't in the cards.
As things go, Sotomayor isn't bad. She isn't overtly political, like Patrick or Holder would have been. She isnt radical. She isnt out of left field but actually has judicial experience.
Suck it up and go on fighting the real issues.

[smith revolver cop]

Look on the bright side... she apparently has a history of being reversed on appeal. Now, there's no higher court that can reverse her! Her nomination is truly the "Peter Principle" at work...

[coleman]

http://www.nationaljournal.com...or_20090523_2724.php


OPENING ARGUMENT
Identity Politics And Sotomayor

The judge's thinking is representative of the Democratic Party's powerful identity-politics wing.

by Stuart Taylor

Saturday, May 23, 2009


"I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion [as a judge] than a white male who hasn't lived that life." -- Judge Sonia Sotomayor, in her Judge Mario G. Olmos Law and Cultural Diversity Lecture at the University of California (Berkeley) School of Law in 2001

The above assertion and the rest of a remarkable speech to a Hispanic group by Sotomayor -- widely touted as a possible Obama nominee to the Supreme Court -- has drawn very little attention in the mainstream media since it was quoted deep inside The New York Times on May 15.

[BLACKHAWKNJ]

We must remember Eisenhower's statement that he made 2 Big Mistakes as President and they were both sitting on the Supreme Court. As long as we allow the concept of judicial supremacy to be the law of this land and allow appointed judges to ride roughshod over elected reprsentatives we will be no better off than the Iranians with their "Council of Experts".

[Louis]

from Reason.com

Sonia Sotomayor on Gun Rights and Racial Preferences
Why libertarians—and everyone who believes in limited government—should worry about Barack Obama's Supreme Court nominee

Damon W. Root | May 26, 2009

President Barack Obama's announcement that he wants federal appeals court Judge Sonia Sotomayor to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice David Souter comes as something less than a shock. For months, Sotomayor's name has topped most lists of potential candidates. With her compelling personal story, which stretches from a Bronx, New York housing project to Yale Law School to the federal Second Circuit Court of Appeals, Sotomayor's likely appointment as the Court's first Hispanic justice nicely complements Obama's own "only in America" narrative.

But when it comes to her judicial philosophy, there are some real causes for concern. In particular, on the hot-button issues of affirmative action and Second Amendment rights, her record suggests a decidedly illiberal vision of constitutional law.

Consider affirmative action. Last month, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the case of Ricci v. Destefano, which centered on charges of reverse discrimination at the New Haven, Connecticut fire department.

In 2003 the department administered a test to fill 15 captain and lieutenant vacancies, but when the results came in, no African Americans made the cut (14 whites and one Hispanic earned the top scores). In response to local pressure, the city then refused to certify the results and decided instead to leave the positions open until a suitable new test was developed. This prompted a lawsuit from a group of white firefighters who had been denied promotion, including lead plaintiff Frank Ricci, a 34-year-old dyslexic who says he spent months preparing for the now-voided test by listening to audiotape study guides as he drove to work.

Ricci's suit was initially thrown out at the district court level, prompting an appeal to the Second Circuit. At that point Sotomayor joined in an unsigned opinion embracing the district court's analysis without offering any analysis of its own.

This prompted fellow Second Circuit Judge Jose Cabranes—a liberal Democrat appointed by President Bill Clinton—to issue a stern rebuke. "The opinion contains no reference whatsoever to the constitutional claims at the core of this case," Cabranes wrote. "This perfunctory disposition rests uneasily with the weighty issues presented by this appeal."

It's an important point. Ricci gets at the very heart of the debate over whether the Constitution should be interpreted as a colorblind document. As the liberal legal commenter Emily Bazelon noted at Slate, "If Sotomayor and her colleagues were trying to shield the case from Supreme Court review, her punt had the opposite effect. It drew Cabranes' ire, and he hung a big red flag on the case, which the Supreme Court grabbed."

Given that the Court is likely to side with Ricci and his fellow plaintiffs, Sotomayor's silent endorsement of New Haven's reverse discrimination is certain to come back to haunt her during her confirmation hearings.

Equally troubling is Sotomayor's record on the Second Amendment. This past January, the Second Circuit issued its opinion in Maloney v. Cuomo, which Sotomayor joined, ruling that the Second Amendment does not apply against state and local governments. At issue was a New York ban on various weapons, including nunchucks. After last year's District of Columbia v. Heller, which struck down DC's handgun ban, attention turned to whether state and local gun control laws might violate the Second Amendment as well.

"It is settled law," Sotomayor and the Second Circuit held, "that the Second Amendment applies only to limitations the federal government seeks to impose on this right." But contrast that with the Ninth Circuit's decision last month in Nordyke v. King, which reached a very different conclusion, one that matches the Second Amendment's text, original meaning, and history:

We therefore conclude that the right to keep and bear arms is "deeply rooted in this Nation's history and tradition." Colonial revolutionaries, the Founders, and a host of commentators and lawmakers living during the first one hundred years of the Republic all insisted on the fundamental nature of the right. It has long been regarded as the "true palladium of liberty."

Colonists relied on it to assert and to win their independence, and the victorious Union sought to prevent a recalcitrant South from abridging it less than a century later. The crucial role this deeply rooted right has played in our birth and history compels us to recognize that it is indeed fundamental, that it is necessary to the Anglo-American conception of ordered liberty that we have inherited. We are therefore persuaded that the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment incorporates the Second Amendment and applies it against the states and local governments.

This split between the two circuits means that the Supreme Court is almost certain to take up the question in the near future. What role might soon-to-be Justice Sotomayor play? As gun rights scholar and Independence Institute Research Director Dave Kopel told me via email, Sotomayor's opinions "demonstrate a profound hostility to Second Amendment rights. If we follow Senator Obama's principle that Senators should vote against judges whose views on legal issues are harmful, then it is hard to see how someone who supports Second Amendment rights could vote to confirm Sonia Sotomayor."

As a respected jurist with an impressive legal resume, Sotomayor appears just as qualified to sit on the Supreme Court as any recent nominee. But from the standpoint of individual liberty and limited constitutional government, there are significant reasons to be wary of her nomination.

Damon W. Root is a Reason associate editor.

[Louis]

more on Sotomayor from a very liberal site, The New Republic.com

The Case Against Sotomayor
Indictments of Obama's front-runner to replace Souter.

Jeffrey Rosen, The New Republic Published: Monday, May 04, 2009

This is the first in a series of reports by TNR legal affairs editor Jeffrey Rosen about the strengths and weaknesses of the leading candidates on Barack Obama's Supreme Court shortlist.

A judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, Sonia Sotomayor's biography is so compelling that many view her as the presumptive front-runner for Obama's first Supreme Court appointment. She grew up in the South Bronx, the daughter of Puerto Rican parents. Her father, a manual laborer who never attended high school, died a year after she was diagnosed with diabetes at the age of eight.

She was raised by her mother, a nurse, and went to Princeton and then Yale Law School. She worked as a New York assistant district attorney and commercial litigator before Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan recommended her as a district court nominee to the first President Bush. She would be the first Hispanic Supreme Court justice, if you don't count Benjamin Cardozo. (She went to Catholic schools and would also be the sixth Catholic justice on the current Supreme Court if she is, in fact, Catholic, which isn't clear from her official biography.) And she has powerful supporters: Last month, the two senators from New York wrote to President Obama in a burst of demographic enthusiasm, urging him to appoint Sotomayor or Ken Salazar.

Sotomayor's former clerks sing her praises as a demanding but thoughtful boss whose personal experiences have given her a commitment to legal fairness. "She is a rule-bound pragmatist--very geared toward determining what the right answer is and what the law dictates, but her general approach is, unsurprisingly, influenced by her unique background," says one former clerk. "She grew up in a situation of disadvantage, and was able, by virtue of the system operating in such a fair way, to accomplish what she did. I think she sees the law as an instrument that can accomplish the same thing for other people, a system that, if administered fairly, can give everyone the fair break they deserve, regardless of who they are."

Her former clerks report that because Sotomayor is divorced and has no children, her clerks become like her extended family--working late with her, visiting her apartment once a month for card games (where she remembers their favorite drinks), and taking a field trip together to the premier of a Harry Potter movie.

But despite the praise from some of her former clerks, and warm words from some of her Second Circuit colleagues, there are also many reservations about Sotomayor. Over the past few weeks, I've been talking to a range of people who have worked with her, nearly all of them former law clerks for other judges on the Second Circuit or former federal prosecutors in New York. Most are Democrats and all of them want President Obama to appoint a judicial star of the highest intellectual caliber who has the potential to change the direction of the court.

Nearly all of them acknowledged that Sotomayor is a presumptive front-runner, but nearly none of them raved about her. They expressed questions about her temperament, her judicial craftsmanship, and most of all, her ability to provide an intellectual counterweight to the conservative justices, as well as a clear liberal alternative.

The most consistent concern was that Sotomayor, although an able lawyer, was "not that smart and kind of a bully on the bench," as one former Second Circuit clerk for another judge put it. "She has an inflated opinion of herself, and is domineering during oral arguments, but her questions aren't penetrating and don't get to the heart of the issue." (During one argument, an elderly judicial colleague is said to have leaned over and said, "Will you please stop talking and let them talk?")

Second Circuit judge Jose Cabranes, who would later become her colleague, put this point more charitably in a 1995 interview with The New York Times: "She is not intimidated or overwhelmed by the eminence or power or prestige of any party, or indeed of the media."

Her opinions, although competent, are viewed by former prosecutors as not especially clean or tight, and sometimes miss the forest for the trees. It's customary, for example, for Second Circuit judges to circulate their draft opinions to invite a robust exchange of views. Sotomayor, several former clerks complained, rankled her colleagues by sending long memos that didn't distinguish between substantive and trivial points, with petty editing suggestions--fixing typos and the like--rather than focusing on the core analytical issues.

Some former clerks and prosecutors expressed concerns about her command of technical legal details: In 2001, for example, a conservative colleague, Ralph Winter, included an unusual footnote in a case suggesting that an earlier opinion by Sotomayor might have inadvertently misstated the law in a way that misled litigants.

The most controversial case in which Sotomayor participated is Ricci v. DeStefano, the explosive case involving affirmative action in the New Haven fire department, which is now being reviewed by the Supreme Court. A panel including Sotomayor ruled against the firefighters in a perfunctory unpublished opinion. This provoked Judge Cabranes, a fellow Clinton appointee, to object to the panel's opinion that contained "no reference whatsoever to the constitutional issues at the core of this case." (The extent of Sotomayor's involvement in the opinion itself is not publicly known.)

Not all the former clerks for other judges I talked to were skeptical about Sotomayor. "I know the word on the street is that she's not the brainiest of people, but I didn't have that experience," said one former clerk for another judge. "She's an incredibly impressive person, she's not shy or apologetic about who she is, and that's great."

This supporter praised Sotomayor for not being a wilting violet. "She commands attention, she's clearly in charge, she speaks her mind, she's funny, she's voluble, and she has ownership over the role in a very positive way," she said. "She's a fine Second Circuit judge--maybe not the smartest ever, but how often are Supreme Court nominees the smartest ever?"

I haven't read enough of Sotomayor's opinions to have a confident sense of them, nor have I talked to enough of Sotomayor's detractors and supporters, to get a fully balanced picture of her strengths. It's possible that the former clerks and former prosecutors I talked to have an incomplete picture of her abilities.

But they're not motivated by sour grapes or by ideological disagreement--they'd like the most intellectually powerful and politically effective liberal justice possible. And they think that Sotomayor, although personally and professionally impressive, may not meet that demanding standard. Given the stakes, the president should obviously satisfy himself that he has a complete picture before taking a gamble.

Jeffrey Rosen is the legal affairs editor at The New Republic.

[coleman]

http://www.newsmax.com/insidec...al&promo_code=807F-1


Sotomayor Hostile to Gun Rights, Scholar Says

Wednesday, May 27, 2009 1:04 AM



Federal appeals court Judge Sonia Sotomayor has over the years developed what some experts are calling a ‘troubling’ record on Second Amendment issues.

In January, President Obama’s nominee to the Supreme Court joined an opinion, Maloney v. Cuomo, that ruled that the Second Amendment does not apply against state and local governments, according to Reason magazine.

The case dealt with a New York ban on various weapons, including nunchucks. After last year's District of Columbia v. Heller, which struck down DC's handgun ban, attention turned to whether state and local gun control laws might violate the Second Amendment as well.

"It is settled law," Sotomayor and the Second Circuit held, "that the Second Amendment applies only to limitations the federal government seeks to impose on this right."

But that Second Circuit ruling ran counter to a Ninth Circuit decision last month in Nordyke v. King, which upheld the Second Amendment as a deeply held right embodied in the Constitution that transcends state law.

“We therefore conclude that the right to keep and bear arms is "deeply rooted in this Nation's history and tradition," the Ninth Circuit ruling said. “Colonial revolutionaries, the Founders, and a host of commentators and lawmakers living during the first one hundred years of the Republic all insisted on the fundamental nature of the right. It has long been regarded as the ‘true palladium of liberty.’ Colonists relied on it to assert and to win their independence, and the victorious Union sought to prevent a recalcitrant South from abridging it less than a century later. The crucial role this deeply rooted right has played in our birth and history compels us to recognize that it is indeed fundamental, that it is necessary to the Anglo-American conception of ordered liberty that we have inherited. We are therefore persuaded that the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment incorporates the Second Amendment and applies it against the states and local governments.”

The contrasting opinions suggest that the issue is almost certainly going to go before the high court in the near future. What role might soon-to-be Justice Sotomayor play? Gun rights scholar and Independence Institute Research Director Dave Kopel told Reason that Sotomayor's opinions "demonstrate a profound hostility to Second Amendment rights. If we follow Senator Obama's principle that Senators should vote against judges whose views on legal issues are harmful, then it is hard to see how someone who supports Second Amendment rights could vote to confirm Sonia Sotomayor."

[norad45]

Imagine the uproar there would have been at his confirmation hearings if, sometime in his past, Justice Roberts had said the following--in any context:

"I would hope that a wise European man with the richness of his experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion [as a judge] than a latina woman who hasn't lived that life."

[USAF385]

Originally posted by norad45:
Imagine the uproar there would have been at his confirmation hearings if, sometime in his past, Justice Roberts had said the following--in any context:

"I would hope that a wise European man with the richness of his experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion [as a judge] than a latina woman who hasn't lived that life."

+1!

No matter what context in which that was said, there would have been such outrage.

[coleman]

Sotomayor Ruled That States Do Not Have to Obey Second Amendment
Thursday, May 28, 2009
By Matt Cover


President Barack Obama looks on as his Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor speaks in the East Room of the White House in Washington, Tuesday May 26, 2009. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais )
(CNSNews.com) – Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor ruled in January 2009 that states do not have to obey the Second Amendment’s commandment that the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.

In Maloney v. Cuomo, Sotomayor signed an opinion of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit that said the Second Amendment does not protect individuals from having their right to keep and bear arms restricted by state governments.

The opinion said that the Second Amendment only restricted the federal government from infringing on an individual's right to keep and bear arms. As justification for this position, the opinion cited the 1886 Supreme Court case of Presser v. Illinois.

“It is settled law, however, that the Second Amendment applies only to limitations the federal government seeks to impose on this right,” said the opinion. Quoting Presser, the court said, “it is a limitation only upon the power of Congress and the national government, and not upon that of the state.”

The Maloney v. Cuomo case involved James Maloney, who had been arrested for possessing a pair of nunchuks. New York law prohibits the possession of nunchuks, even though they are often used in martial arts training and demonstrations.

The meaning of the Second Amendment has rarely been addressed by the Supreme Court. But in the 2008 case of Heller v. District of Columbia, the high court said that the right to keep and bear arms was a natural right of all Americans and that the Second Amendment guaranteed that right to everyone.

The Second Amendment, the Supreme Court ruled, “guarantee(s) the right of the individual to possess and carry weapons in case of confrontation. The very text of the Second Amendment implicitly recognizes the pre-existence of the right and declares only that it ‘shall not be infringed.’”

“There seems to us no doubt,” the Supreme Court said, “that the Second Amendment conferred an individual right to keep and bear arms.”

Sotomayor, however, said that even though the Heller decision held that the right to keep and bear arms was a natural right--and therefore could not be justly denied to a law-abiding citizen by any government, federal, state or local--the Second Circuit was still bound by the 1886 case, because Heller only dealt indirectly with the issue before her court.

“And to the extent that Heller might be read to question the continuing validity of this principle, we must follow Presser because where, as here, a Supreme Court precedent has direct application in a case, yet appears to rest on reasons rejected in some other line of decisions, the Court of Appeals should follow the case which [it] directly controls.”

In its 2008 case, the Supreme Court’s took a different view of its own 1886 case, saying that Presser had no bearing on anything beyond a state’s ability to outlaw private militia groups.

“Presser said nothing about the Second Amendment’s meaning or scope, beyond the fact that it does not prevent the prohibition of private paramilitary organizations,” the court ruled. “This does not refute the individual-rights interpretation of the Amendment.”

The Second Amendment is the only part of the Bill of Rights that the Supreme Court has not specifically extended to the states through a process known as incorporation, which involves interpreting the Fourteenth Amendment to read that no state can deprive its citizens of federally guaranteed rights.

The Fourteenth Amendment reads, in part: “No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States … nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”

Sotomayor’s decision rejected the Fourteenth Amendment’s incorporation doctrine as far as Second Amendment was concerned, saying any legislation that could provide a “conceivable” reason would be upheld by her court.

“We will uphold legislation if we can identify some reasonably conceived state of facts that could provide a rational basis for the legislative action. Legislative acts that do not interfere with fundamental rights … carry with them a strong presumption of constitutionality,” the appeals court concluded. “The Fourteenth Amendment,” she wrote, “provides no relief.”

Sotomayor’s ruling ran to the left of even the reliably liberal San Francisco-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, which ruled in the April 2009 case Nordyke v. King that the Second Amendment did, in fact, apply to the states via the Fourteenth Amendment, heavily citing the Supreme Court in Heller.

“We therefore conclude that the right to keep and bear arms is deeply rooted in this Nation’s history and tradition,” said the Ninth Circuit court of Appeals. “We are therefore persuaded that the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment incorporates the Second Amendment and applies it against the states and local governments.”

Gun Week Senior Editor Dave Workman told CNSNews.com that the Nordyke and Maloney decisions are at odds and the Supreme Court, possibly with a Justice Sotomayor, may soon sort them out.

“Whenever you have a conflict like this, you’re likely to have it end up before the Supreme Court so they can decide the issue. If the Second Amendment is incorporated into the states, it’s going to jeopardize thousands of local gun laws, and the people who supported those gun laws are just freaked about that.”

[chip357]

http://www.foxnews.com/politic...nservative-backlash/

This concerns me greatly

[coleman]

http://www.stoptheaclu.com/200...ayor-la-raza-member/

Sotomayor ‘La Raza member’

Barack Obama has picked a radical for his nominee to the Supreme Court. If her own statements are not enough to convince you of her racist attitude, perhaps the fact she belongs to an anti-white extremist group known as La Raza will.

[Louis]

Based on things I've read so far, I've developed a negative view of this person's objectivity in deciding cases. Sad thing is, she might not be as bad as those in line behind her for nomination.
Louis

in WashingtonTimes.com:

EDITORIAL: The franchise for felons

Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor wants to give jailbirds the right to vote. It's her opinion that the federal Voting Rights Act can be used to force states to allow voting by currently imprisoned felons. Ms. Sotomayor's dissenting opinion in a 2006 felon-voting case should make senators extremely wary of confirming her for the high court.

In Hayden v. Pataki, a number of inmates in New York state filed suit claiming that because blacks and Latinos make up a disproportionate share of the prison population, the state's refusal to allow them ballot access amounts to an unlawful, race-based denial of their right to vote. Eight of 13 judges on the liberal-leaning Second Circuit dismissed their arguments, and the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled likewise in a similar case.

Yet, operating on a dubious and extremely broad reading of the Voting Rights Act, Ms. Sotomayor dissented from the decision. In a remarkably dismissive, four-paragraph opinion, she alleged that the "plain terms" of the Voting Rights Act would allow such race-based claims to go forward.

Judge Jose Cabranes, who like Ms. Sotomayor was appointed by President Bill Clinton, didn't find the matter to be so clear. His majority decision against the criminal felons, in favor of the state, comprised 36 tightly reasoned pages. Particularly compelling is the fact that the Voting Rights Act was passed to help further the aims of the Constitution's 14th and 15th Amendments. The 14th Amendment specifically allows states to deny the vote to those convicted of crimes.

Ms. Sotomayor is thus in the position of asserting that Congress can prohibit New York from doing something the Constitution itself specifically endorses. It's as if she thinks black and Hispanic felons are convicted in order to deny them the vote, rather than that they are denied the vote as a result of being duly convicted. Her position ignores the fact that it is the convicts' own actions, their crimes - not any state-based racial discrimination - that make those felons ineligible to vote.

As almost every state has done since the United States was founded, New York forbids currently incarcerated or paroled prisoners from voting. Some states go even farther by prohibiting some felons from voting even after they have served their sentences. New York's law is not so stringent. It only applies to felons still under criminal sentences. It equally applies to all felons, black or white.

There is growing evidence that Judge Sotomayor believes some races are more equal than others. She said in a 2001 speech that she would expect a Latina judge to reach the right decision more often than would a white male judge. Her dissenting opinion in Hayden v. Pataki is another example of her taking racial grievance-mongering to absurd new depths. They are depths unbefitting a Supreme Court justice.

[BarbC]

By Sotomayor's line of reasoning in Maloney, each and every federal right would be subjected to the whims of the states.

Dazzling legal brilliance she has not.


Here is an interesting blurb from a book review of LEADERS OF THE PACK: POLLS & CASE STUDIES OF GREAT SUPREME COURT JUSTICES, by William D. Pederson and Norman W. Provizer


The final chapter in LEADERS OF THE PACK is a provocative essay by David Schultz titled, "Why No More Giants on the Supreme Court: The Personalities and the Times." Schultz asserts that two characteristics make a justice great: 1) "creat[ing] a new paradigm for him or herself, the Court, or the law," and 2) the ability to "persuade others, on the Court, in government, and in society to adopt a particular perspective on the law" (p.264). He cites John Marshall, Joseph Story, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Louis Brandeis, Benjamin Cardozo, Hugo Black, Earl Warren, and William Brennan, as examples of justices who succeeded in this regard.

Schultz then evaluates the current justices against these two characteristics and concludes that none of them have the potential for greatness. He suggests three primary reasons for this. First, they are serving "at a time when there is a diminished expectation of stated desire for them and the Court to engage in major jurisprudence or legal thinking" (p.270). Second, the post-Bork confirmation process has contributed to the selection of justices who are "confirmable," not because of their intellectual ability. Schultz writes, "This is not to imply that these justices are idiots, but instead to suggest that an important reason for their being on the Court is that they were deemed acceptable and that they would be worthy delegates for the president who nominated them" (p.271). The third factor is that legal education in the post-World War II era is more technically focused than oriented to the liberal arts. Schultz sums up his pessimism about the future in the first paragraph of his conclusion: "There are no giants on the Supreme Court today and the prospect is that for the foreseeable future that will remain true. Many structural and ideological forces are at work that make it difficult for a new giant to emerge, or for any of the current justices to rise to that level" (p.273).

[Grandma]

Originally posted by chip357:
http://www.foxnews.com/politic...nservative-backlash/

This concerns me greatly

The last line of this article is very disturbing and concerns me greatly as to what will be left of our constitiution when they are finished "interpeting" it.

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said Thursday that Obama was <u>"very comfortable with her interpretation of the Constitution being similar to that of his."</u>

[coleman]

Miguel Estrada

And if Democrats insist on playing identity politics, I suggest a two-word response: Miguel Estrada, the Honduran immigrant with his own rags-to-riches story whose nomination to the D.C. Circuit Democrats successfully filibustered, effectively preventing George W. Bush from naming the first Hispanic Supreme Court justice.
http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITI....identity/index.html