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Sotomayor denies any racial bias
Source: Agencies |
July 15, 2009, Wednesday
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SONIA Sotomayor, United States President Barack Obama's first choice for the US Supreme Court, stoutly denied racial bias yesterday at her Senate confirmation hearing and said an oft-criticized remark about her Hispanic heritage affecting her decisions was a rhetorical device gone awry.
An attempted play on words ?¨fell flat? in a speech in 2001, Sotomayor said, referring to remarks in which she suggested that a ?¨wise Latina woman? would usually reach a better conclusion than a white male.
Sotomayor is all but certain of confirmation as the first Hispanic on the highest US court as Democrats dominate both the Judiciary Committee, which will cast the first votes, and the full Senate chamber, unless she stumbles at this week??s hearings.
?¨It was bad because it left an impression that I believed that life experiences commanded a result in a case, but that??s clearly not what I do as a judge,? Sotomayor said.
Senator Jeff Sessions, the top Republican on the Judiciary Committee, sounded unconvinced.
?¨As a judge who has taken this oath, I am very troubled that you would repeatedly over a decade or more make statements? like the one in 2001, he said.
On an issue faced by all high court nominees, Sotomayor said the US Constitution contains a right to privacy, a forerunner of the right to abortion that the high court first outlined in its 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling.
An attempted play on words ?¨fell flat? in a speech in 2001, Sotomayor said, referring to remarks in which she suggested that a ?¨wise Latina woman? would usually reach a better conclusion than a white male.
Sotomayor is all but certain of confirmation as the first Hispanic on the highest US court as Democrats dominate both the Judiciary Committee, which will cast the first votes, and the full Senate chamber, unless she stumbles at this week??s hearings.
?¨It was bad because it left an impression that I believed that life experiences commanded a result in a case, but that??s clearly not what I do as a judge,? Sotomayor said.
Senator Jeff Sessions, the top Republican on the Judiciary Committee, sounded unconvinced.
?¨As a judge who has taken this oath, I am very troubled that you would repeatedly over a decade or more make statements? like the one in 2001, he said.
On an issue faced by all high court nominees, Sotomayor said the US Constitution contains a right to privacy, a forerunner of the right to abortion that the high court first outlined in its 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling.
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