Hello. I am Sonia Maria Sotomayor, the first Latina Supreme Court Justice in U.S history. As of today, I am 62-years-old and am still a U.S. Supreme Court justice. I have helped with several important cases, including the Obergefell v. Hodges case (the groundbreaking case in which the court decided to legalize same-sex marriage), and the el Silverman v. Major League Baseball Player Relations Committee, Inc case.
Alas, I suppose I should start at the beginning.
Born to Hispanic immigrants Juan and Celina Baez Sotomayor on June, 25th, 1954, I was raised in the Bronx (one of New York’s five boroughs) as the eldest of two. My brother, Juan Sotomayor, and I had a happy childhood, until my father died suddenly in 1963, leaving us in my mother’s care. Though my mother barely made due as a nurse, she managed to send my
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Along with participating in various Hispanic/Latina Support organizations, I additionally operated as co-editor of the Yale Law Journal, publishing law and federal articles. After graduating from Yale in 1979, with a J.D (Juris Doctor) degree in tow, I went on to work in the office of Robert Morgenthau, a famous Manhattan attorney; together, we succeeded in prosecuting everything from petty theft to homicides to child pornography charges. Five years later, I left Morgenthau’s firm and moved to a private firm in league with Pavia and Harcourt, which specialized in litigation and property rights, before divorcing Kevin Noonan in 1988.
I gained fame quickly and it wasn’t long until one of the big guns noticed me; Senator Daniel Moynihan recommended me to the president at the time, George H. W. Bush, who promoted me to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. From there I saw many cases, including the Silverman v. Major League Baseball Player Relations Committee, Inc case, in which my decision ended the 9-month-long strike, and several
In spite of Claiborne’s impeachment, he continued to practice law in Nevada in 1987. What is interesting about Claiborne is that continued to claim
No one has any idea of what the new supreme court will be like every time they are chosen. Even the presidents and officials who appoint them can only presume what kind of future the new supreme court holds. A good example would be Sonia Sotomayor, the first latino justice chosen by president Barack Obama who chose her because he felt that she had a bright future, but in reality she didn’t really stand out much. She is often compared to the first African American and first female justice, who did in fact break racial and gender barriers but weren’t generally seen as intellectual leaders. A trend in the recent decades displays that presidents typically nominate candidates with high academics, judicial resumes, a history of controversial speeches,
President Barack Obama nominated Sonia Sotomayor for Supreme Court justice on May 26, 2009, making Sonia Sotomayor the first Hispanic female to be nominated for higher court. Sonia Sotomayor was born on June 25, 1954. She is currently a federal judge on the U.S Courts of Appeals for a Second Circuit. If nominated she will be replacing the retiring Justice David Souter and she will also be the first Hispanic and the third female Justice. This will be a huge milestone for the Hispanic community. Looking closely into Sotomayor qualification and experience we can predict that she will most likely be approved by the Senate.
In Hinojosa's essay "A Supreme Sotomayor: How My County Has Caught Up to Me" she writes, "She stayed focused. She worked hard. She never closed the doors on herself, like so many strong women of color sometimes do..." (22). This quotation suggests that she views Sotomayor as a very determined woman. She adds in the word strong which hints at the fact that she isn't just talking women of color, but strong women of color. This paints a picture of a strong determined woman. Looking past whatever circumstances she is living in, educational background, etc she is saying that they are strong and have the ability to do bug things like Sotomayer, but tend to close the doors on their own opportunities. I also find that this sentence jumps out
Sonia Sotomayor’s book is about her life and her climb from the streets of New York to the place that she is today. Her book explains the challenges that she faced growing up, losing her father at such a young age and working hard to accomplish the great achievements that she has accomplished today. She explains how her upbringing affected how she turned out in life. She explains what it takes for a woman of a Latino origin to sit on the bench, and she explains her reasoning. Sonia shows how she used what she has learnt from her past experiences and how she applied these lessons to the new situations she faced in her life. The book is distributed all over the United States and inspired more and more Latinos every day. In this way, she has helped them by giving them an inspirational story that will be told for years to come, and she will be remembered for much more than her book.
In Sonia Sotomayor’s speech “A Latina Judge’s Voice”, delivered at the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law in 2001, Sotomayor analyzes her life growing up as a Puerto Rican woman in New York with immigrant parents. She incorporates various examples of how her traditional background has remained with her in New York, while also explaining to law students how she has stayed uneducated in different areas of her culture. The contrast appears to be seen by Sotomayor including personal family traditions, while on the other hand, uncovering the identity confusion which is not commonly discussed. Sotomayor’s Puerto Rican-born parents immigrated to the United States during World War II with the hopes of seeking greater opportunity and advanced safety.
Back in the 1950s, Mexican Americans did not have the courage to stand up and fight for their rights because they were afraid of the outcome and the problems this could have caused. They had to live with the burden of discrimination every day, mainly in the Southwest. Mexican Americans were considered invisible and uneducated. However, when the case Hernandez v. Texas occurred, a very courageous lawyer, Gustavo ‘Gus’ Garcia, along with other lawyers, took this opportunity to stand up for their civil rights.
Inclusion in Writing: Finding Your Audience In her short article, “A Supreme Sotomayor: How My Country Has Caught Up to Me”, Maria Hinojosa talks about how she and her friends, most of whom were Latina, felt when the first Puerto Rican woman was nominated to serve as a Supreme Court Justice. Hinojosa describes how she felt shocked when she heard the news that a woman of her nationality had been nominated for such a powerful position by the president himself. She illustrates the struggle of Latinas having to work harder to be taken seriously, and that they “are brilliant and accomplished but oftentimes minimized to a mere stereotype that is disconnected from reality.” (Kirszner and Mendell 22).
Over the past 50 or so years great strides have been made on the subject of Latino-American civil rights. The first pivotal victory for Latin-American civil rights was labeled the “Longoria Affair” and would lead to the opportunity of having Latin-American individuals hold offices in the political sphere of America. It is unfortunate that it does not get the recognition it deserves in the annals of American civil rights.
Throughout history many U.S. Supreme Court Justices have served for numerous years on the Supreme court making final decisions on diverse cases that have created long lasting impacts. The current supreme court justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and former justice Sandra Day O’Connor have not only made an impact but are proof that women are equal to men when it comes to court room decisions. Throughout the essay I will explain the background of the justice, the president who appointed them, and the accomplishments made on the Supreme Court.
“The Road Not Taken” and Sotomayor’s life can connect with the important decision that impacted both people greatly. In “The Road Not Taken”, the narrator was faced with a decision on which road should he/she take. The story mentions, “And be one traveler, long I stood”, showing that this decision wasn’t quick and simple. In Sotomayor’s life, at a young age, she was given job suggestions that she could take. This happened because she was a diabetic and had a limited amount of jobs in her future. Some roads available to her were a doctor, a lawyer, an architect, an engineer, a nurse, and a teacher. Along with this list, as the story states, “There was a list of professions that were out-of-bounds.” With this, the decision became tougher to choose
A diverse minority group of Latino and Spanish-speaking peoples has played an important part of what it means to be American and what it means to be a citizen in the United States today. Moving into the future, in order to analyze the trajectory that this group is in, we must first understand the group’s history in the United States and in territories that would become the United States. In addition, we must look at the origins of the most recent wave of Latino immigration in order to understand their current effect on American society and the intersection between both minority and majority groups. Finally, we get to the apex of this investigation: what lies in the future for Latino Americans in the United States? Although Latino
Chief Justice John Roberts, Jr., was sworn into the Supreme Court on September 29, 2005 and was nominated by President George W. Bush. John Roberts, Jr., took the place of Chief Justice William Renquist after he passed away and the seat became open. His political affiliation is Republican and he has worked for
Lee Strobel, Master of Studies in Law from Yale Law School. Award-winning journalist & investigative reporter for 13 yrs. at the Chicago Tribune. Pg. 303.
Gonzalez opens this chapter with, conceivably, the harshest narrative he could find to support his claims: He writes of a Latina mother forced by a judge to speak English to her daughter at home if she wanted to retain custody (Gonzalez 206). He continues on to describe the three categories of people affected by the