Create a free Diverse: Issues In Higher Education account to continue reading. Already have an account? Enter your email to access the article.

Sotomayor OK’d for Supreme Court in Historic Vote

WASHINGTON  

Sonia Sotomayor won confirmation Thursday as the nation’s first Hispanic Supreme Court justice in a history-making Senate vote that capped a summer-long debate heavy with ethnic politics. Sotomayor will be sworn in Saturday as the court’s 111th justice, third woman and first nominee by a Democrat in 15 years. The Senate vote was 68-31 to confirm Sotomayor, President Barack Obama’s first Supreme Court nominee.

The 55-year-old daughter of Puerto Rican parents was raised in a South Bronx housing project and educated in the Ivy League before rising to the highest legal echelons, spending the past 17 years as a federal judge.

A majority of Republicans lined up against her, arguing she would bring personal bias and a liberal agenda to the bench. But Democrats praised Sotomayor as an extraordinarily qualified mainstream moderate and touted her elevation to the court as a milestone in the nation’s journey toward greater equality and a reaffirmation of the American dream.

Obama, the nation’s first Black president, praised the Senate’s vote as “breaking another barrier and moving us yet another step closer to a more perfect union.”

Minutes before the vote, Sen. Robert Menendez of New Jersey, the Senate’s lone Hispanic Democrat, said, “History awaits and so does an anxious Hispanic community in this country.”

The trusted source for all job seekers
We have an extensive variety of listings for both academic and non-academic positions at postsecondary institutions.
Read More
The trusted source for all job seekers