What Kind Of Justice Would Sotomayor Be?

A panel discussion today hosted by the American Constitution Society grappled with the factors likely to shape how Sonia Sotomayor would perform as a Supreme Court justice. Her judicial background on the appellate court -- as well as her ethnic identity -- framed the debate, with panelists sparring over how much these factors could or should influence her judicial decision-making.

Wade Henderson, president of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, pointed to Sotomayor's extensive tenure on the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals as the most appropriate basis to examine her judicial thinking. "The best evidence" of her future rulings can be "drawn from ones she's already made," Henderson said, not "her ethnicity or empathy or gender."

Ed Whelan, president of the Ethics and Public Policy and contributor to the National Review Online Bench Memos blog, isn't so sure Sotomayor's opinions offer the best window into how she could ultimately perform as a jurist on the high court. He said her speeches, most notably the one containing her "wise Latina woman" comment, offer a better glimpse into her philosophy than her written opinions from the bench, in which she is restrained by precedent. Appellate court judges are bound by precedent in a way that high court justices are not, Whelan reasoned.

New York University law professor Cristina Rodriguez agreed with Henderson that Sotomayor's appellate record should be the "most important evidence of how she would be as a judge" but agreed with Whelan that she is constrained by precedent and predicting how she'll rule as a justice based on that record is difficult. "She's going to have much more freedom on the Supreme Court," Rodriguez said. "We don't really know what kind of Supreme Court justice she will be. Most justices are very different at the end of their careers than what people expected them to be at the beginning."

http://ninthjustice.nationaljournal.com/2009/06/what-kind-of-justice.php

see the discussion here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x8463461

female high school student disqualified for student government office in election she won for calling school officials "douchebags" and advocating activism was upheld by Sotomayor.

READ THE LINKS there

She is the enemy of the First Amendment.

The idea that schools can treat off-campus speech the same as on-campus speech is disgusting, and she embraces it.

http://www.citmedialaw.org/threats/doninger-v-niehoff

...as stated by Sotomayor was that the school is allowed to do these things to teach "a proper respect for authority".

I'm sorry, but calling a bunch of spineless administrators "douchebags" in a private blog is pretty far off from disrespecting authority in such a way as to disqualify a person from a HS class secretary position. If you are a school administrator and cancel a concert because it might be "controversial", then expect the organizers of the concert to call you a douchebag or other similar term to describe one's spinelessness. Comes with the territory.

Overly sensitive administrators backed up by a judge who thinks that schools should be churning out good little authoritarians.....a microcosm of what is wrong with our educational system.

I did not like this ruling at all.

Someone pointed out that Sotomayor was only supposed to rule on procedural grounds, but if that was the case, she should have never slipped in the "proper respect for authority" line in her judgment. That shows too much eagerness to support the authorities on her part, and does not bode well for those that find themselves on the short end of the authoritarian stick and in need of justice before her bench.

Now I do not trust her.

The bar is set pretty low these days.

Friend of capitalist Corporations...

Don't know about her social views -- hopefully not the swing vote on Roe...

I'm not sanguine about someone who was first a prosecutor, then a corporate lawyer then a judge. No defense experience, just proprietorially brainwashed in her first job -- hard indoctrination to recover from...

I think she will be to the right of Souter on issues of crime, presidential authority, and corporate law.

...in the "BONG HiTS 4 JESUS" case:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morse_v._Frederick

Sonia Sotomayor ruled against student First Amendment rights in the "Douchebags" case:
http://open.salon.com/blog/paul_levinson/2009/05/02/sotomayors_bad_1st_amendment_decision_should_disqualify_her

instead of "presidential authority". I think she will be to the right of Souter on those issues.

For the hopefully 30 to 40 years she's on the bench because it will be more "proof" that their rights are being taken away by women and minorities.

TlalocW

Ike thought that Warren would be conservative. I'm sure Poppy didn't think Souter would be as liberal as he has been.

She may not be that committed to a woman's right to choose.

Except perhaps on abortion. On issues I care about like the rights of the accused and curbs on police power she has always been very conservative. I think she will side with the government on pretty much everything. Of course I could be wrong, but her body of work does nothing to dissuade me.