Washinghton, July 14: President Barack Obama’s choice for a soon-to-be-vacant seat on the nine-member Supreme Court, Sonia Sotomayor, found herself centre-stage in a predictably partisan burst of political theatrics on Capitol Hill yesterday as her confirmation hearings finally got under way.
“Our legal system is at a dangerous crossroads,” declared Senator Jeff Sessions, the top-ranking Republican on the Senate’s Judiciary Committee, as he rehearsed his party’s refrain that Ms Sotomayor risks becoming a justice who will allow her own political prejudices to colour her interpretation of the Constitution and the law.
Citing a comment she made in 2001 arguing that a “wise Latina” would be a better judge than “a white male” because of “the richness of her experiences”, Republicans have been warning that she may be tainted by prejudice.
–Agencies