Sotomayor Condemned Antigay Violence

Sotomayor Condemned Antigay Violence
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By Julie Bolcer
Sotomayor Condemned Antigay Violence

Judge Sonia Sotomayor, whose Supreme Court nomination hearings are slated to begin on July 13, was one of 39 members of Princeton University who signed a letter to the campus newspaper in 1976 condemning an attack against a gay student group.

According to The Daily Princetonian, the letter to the editor, published on February 27, 1976, was “written in response to an incident six days before, when eight students ransacked the dorm room of two gay students who were members of the Gay Alliance of Princeton.”

The letter, which can be read in its entirety here, http://www.dailyprincetonian.com/2009/05/15/23734/ would seem to suggest more about the young Sotomayor’s views on the First Amendment than her specific feelings about the gay community.

“No matter how much one may disagree with the Gay Alliance or the policies they are advocating, no matter how repugnant one may find homosexuality, the manner of expressing this opposition should be intellectual,” reads the letter. “At this university we are dedicated to persuasion by reason, not by brute force.”

http://www.advocate.com/news_detail_ektid89284.asp

other expressed views and rulings.