As most know, the Senate Judiciary Committee endorsed the nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to replace Justice David Souter on the Supreme Court. The 13-6 vote split along Democratic/Republican lines with the sole exception of Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC), who voted in favor of Judge Sotomayor.
The Senate Judiciary Committee endorsed
Judge Sonia Sotomayor by a vote of 13-6.
If confirmed by the full Senate,
Ms. Sotomayor would be the 111th
Justice of the Supreme Court.
The full Senate is expected to up take the nomination next week before it adjourns for its August recess. As the New York Times described it, if confirmed the 55-year-old Sotomayor would "be the 111th justice to serve on the Supreme Court, the first Hispanic and the third woman."
On Monday a letter was sent to members of the Senate, expressing its opposition to the confirmation of Judge Sotomayor. You can read the correspondence in its entirety at www.stoptheabortionagenda.com.
Although Sotomayor seems headed for easy confirmation next week, NRL's objections are important to remember because they raise fundamental issues. Let me just briefly address three points made in this thoughtful letter.
1. While Judge Sotomayor "encountered little in the way of abortion-related litigation, either at the district court or the court of appeals," nonetheless "there are many troubling indications that Ms. Sotomayor believes that it is the proper role of the U.S. Supreme Court to construct and enforce constitutional doctrines on social policy questions, even where the text and history of the Constitution provide no basis for removing an issue from the realm of lawmaking by the duly elected representatives of the people." As dissenting Justice Byron White wrote in 1973, Roe was "an exercise of raw judicial power."
2. "The evidence indicates that Ms. Sotomayor approves of the Roe ruling and approves of the type of judicial activism that produced it," write NRL Executive Director David N. O'Steen, Ph.D., and NRL Federal Legislative Director Douglas Johnson. They cite her service on the governing board of the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund (PRLDEF). "During her tenure on the board, the PRLDEF was actively involved in litigation that attempted to persuade the Supreme Court to expand the judge-created 'right to abortion,' often beyond what the Court was willing to embrace."
During this period, the fund joined briefs at the U.S. Supreme Court in six abortion-related cases. "These briefs urged the Court to regard abortion as a 'fundamental right' (a right on the level of freedom of speech), to apply the strictest standard of scrutiny when reviewing abortion-regulated laws, and thereby to nullify informed consent requirements (including those involving ultrasound), waiting periods, parental notification requirements, restrictions on taxpayer funding of abortion, and even record keeping requirements. The PRLDEF's own 'statement of interest' in three of these cases said that the PRLDEF 'opposes any efforts to overturn or in any way restrict the rights recognized in Roe v. Wade.""
As the letter also pointed out, "During her recent confirmation hearings, Ms. Sotomayor suggested that she was only aware of this litigation activity in the most general terms, and had no responsibility for or awareness of the substance of the briefs." About this the letter concluded, "Frankly, this testimony was not very believable."
3. In her testimony Sotomayor often talked of following Supreme Court precedent, as an appeals court judge. But "If confirmed to the U.S. Supreme Court, Ms. Sotomayor will no longer be constrained by the precedents of that Court, including the precedents in which the Court upheld laws requiring notification of a parent before performing an abortion on a minor, requiring a pre-abortion waiting period, barring public funding of abortion, and – by a single vote, in 2007 – banning partial-birth abortion. Nor, it appears, will she feel greatly constrained by the text and history of the Constitution, in which Roe v. Wade and its progeny find no support."
Judge Sotomayor's defenders in the Senate Judiciary Committee and beyond positioned her as "within the mainstream." That, too, I would argue, "was not very believable."
Contact: Dave Andrusko
Source: NRLC
Publish Date: July 29, 2009
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