Obama Picks Latina, Sotomayor, for Supreme Court

Today, President Obama announced Sonia Sotomayor as his pick for the Supreme Court. Sotomayor currently serves as a federal judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. Born to Puerto Rican parents in the housing projects of South Bronx, Sotomayor would eventually graduate with distinction from Princeton University and Yale Law School.

 
SCOTUSblog reviews Judge Sotomayor’s opinions in the appellate court. Below are Sotomayor’s opinions related to civil rights which may be of interest to blackgirlgrown readers:

• During her years on the Second Circuit, Sotomayor has decided cases involving race, sex, age and disability discrimination. In these cases, she has often – but not always – sided with the plaintiffs.
• Sotomayor’s dissent in Gant v. Wallingford Board of Education, 195 F.3d 134 (2d Cir. 1999), is perhaps her most strongly worded opinion addressing discrimination. Plaintiff Ray Gant, who was transferred mid-year from first grade to kindergarten because of academic difficulties, alleged that the school was deliberately indifferent to racial hostility that he suffered and discriminated against him through the transfer. Sotomayor agreed with the majority’s decision to dismiss the racial harassment claim, but she rejected their conclusion that the transfer was not race discrimination.
• Sotomayor has voted to sustain claims alleging a hostile work environment. In Cruz v. Coach Stores, 202 F.3d 560 (2d Cir. 2000), she wrote for the panel in a case brought by a Hispanic woman alleging, inter alia, claims arising from a hostile work environment, failure to promote, and retaliation.
• Sotomayor has been perhaps most sympathetic to claims of discrimination arising from a disability.

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