Fausta's Blog

American and Latin American Politics, Society, and Culture

By

A brief question on identity politics

As the country considers for Supreme Court Justice a woman who actually believes

I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn’t lived that life.

And please do read her entire speech. She said what she meant, and meant what she said.

I would like to ask my readers to consider,

I was born and raised in Puerto Rico. Do you believe that simply because of that fact I am able to “more often than not reach a better conclusion” than my husband, who was born and raised in Pennsylvania?

UPDATE, Saturday 30 May
Another question, Would Judge Sotomayor Qualifiy as a Juror?

Share

Comments

  2. I want someone to ask her how her experience is superior to Miguel Estrada’s experience.

  3. Maybe so, you’ll get my vote if you know who Cristobal de Sotomayer and the Boriqueneers were?

  4. Your experience offers you information and understanding that your Pennsylvanian husband does not, and I’m sure vice-versa. You are (I presume) better together because your differences offer a complementary and fuller set of experiences upon which to base your joint decisions. If this is so, then it is an argument that wider experience on the bench seems like it might be a good idea. Someone else (I can’t cite it handily) suggested that it is the experience that we hire justices for, because if it were just access to the law, then we’d be able to make due with some computers and a couple of law students with photographic memories.

    I’ll leave you with this:

    [W]hen a case comes before me involving, let’s say, someone who is an immigrant—and we get an awful lot of immigration cases and naturalization cases—I can’t help but think of my own ancestors, because it wasn’t that long ago when they were in that position.

    And so it’s my job to apply the law. It’s not my job to change the law or to bend the law to achieve any result. But when I look at those cases, I have to say to myself, and I do say to myself, “You know, this could be your grandfather, this could be your grandmother. They were not citizens at one time, and they were people who came to this country.” …

    When I get a case about discrimination, I have to think about people in my own family who suffered discrimination because of their ethnic background or because of religion or because of gender. And I do take that into account.

    – Justice Samuel Alito.

    http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2009/05/quote_of_the_day_44.cfm

  5. But the rest of Alioto’s statement is boilerplate considering his description of what the limitations of his job are. In other words he simply made some properly sensitive sounds about being sympathetic to that person and not to dismiss their complaint out of hand but also to follow what the law demands and not “…to acheive any result.” Plus I have read his entire statement and he does not claim any special sensitivity because of his descent which Judge Sotomayer surely does.

  7. Does anyone have to rise in today’s elites without insulting a white person’s intelligence?

    I can tell you right now that my husband (a Connecticut Yankee) is a much better engineer and leader than I could ever be. Do I need to put him “down in his place” by implying that, as a Puerto Rican woman, I’m “wiser” than him? If I were to do something like that, we’d be in divorce court sooner rather than later.