As the Senate Judiciary Committee deliberates Judge Sonia Sotomayor’s confirmation to the Supreme Court bench and we reflect on what transpired last week, some of us are left asking: was her hearing tinged with racism, was it about partisanship or did it bring the splintered Latino community in the United States together? This Latino would say, check all the boxes.
Not since Clarence Thomas called his confirmation hearing “a high-tech lynching” have I seen anything quite like last week’s interrogation style. As a matter of fact, Clarence Thomas’ confirmation hearing was a walk-in-the park in comparison (of course, not to Anita Hill). At least Sonia did not have to field any questions about pubic hairs on Coke cans. But Senators Sessions and Graham’s manner of questioning, among other Senators, seemed downright racist and gender biased. Racism is not a word, as a Latino, that I use lightly. I sooner attack our Latino community for its lack of unity than cry racism. However I can’t help feeling that if Judge Sotomayor were an Anglo man, they would not have used the same tone nor injected the same tenor in their questioning.
Unbelievable were the repeated attacks on her Affirmative Action track record in regard to educational history, which are filled with successes making most U.S. patriots, not to speak of parents, proud. As a product of this country’s Affirmative Action programs, I take this as a personal affront. William G. Bowen, former President of Princeton University (from which Sotomayor in 1976 graduated with an A.B., summa cum laude) and Derek Bok, former President of Harvard University wrote in their book The Shape of the River, culled from 20,000 interviews with Affirmative Action alumni, proved that the number one trait commonly shared by most graduates after completing higher education was to go back and give to their communities pulling others up the ladder to attain the “American dream.” Sonia Sotomayor has embodied this persona for decades.
The biggest attack on her was the “wise Latina” statement which she used on occasion in speeches when mentoring, for example, Latino law students. "I would hope,” she said, “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." This sparked cries of racism from some Republicans and she was incessantly questioned about this point at nauseum. Yet two Anglo and Caucasian women who were interviewed on the Charlie Rose Show on June 03rd of this year, Claire Shipman (ABC News) and Katty Katy (BBC World News America) promoting their book Womenomics, said, “This issue gets somewhat controversial, because what we are really saying, and we didn’t start out to say: Women are different than men are. We are different. We are different in the way we manage. We’re different in the way we work – we bring different strengths and we’re different in what we want from the workplace.” Yet no one screamed bloody murder at their statements.
Gender in the hearings was not spared its beating. Sonia Sotomayor was questioned repeatedly by one Senator about her abrasive interpersonal skills as judge based on feedback received from lawyers who served on cases she presided. This reminded me of Barbra Streisand responding to accusations about her abrasive “behind-the-scenes demeanor” while directing, producing, writing and starring in “Yentl,” when she responded that the same attributes in a man would have been shrugged off as inherent to his gender.
Badgering Sonia Sotomayor over and over again about the Second Amendment, which protects the right to keep and bear arms based on her track record in convicting gun-toting urban criminals as Prosecutor in the District Attorney’s office in New York, leaves many of us in major U. S. cities scratching our heads. We’re not talking about shooting squirrels, pigeons or deer for gamier meat for some epicurean adventure. Speak to the widow and families of five police officers shot Friday a week ago, as well as Jersey City Police Chief Comey who said the weapon used was “manufactured for nothing other than to hunt man.”
There was one bright spot to last week, I was heartened and moved to see the Latino community brought together behind this “wise Latina.” From Caucasian Cuban female professionals in Miami to the Mexican community through MALDEF on the west coast, we strutted out our best and articulated the call to stand by Sotomayor and sang her praises. That was not always our history. Take the last time Democrats were in the White House with President Clinton who had the opportunity to nominate a Latino and tried 16 years ago. However, the nominee ended being Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Don’t get me wrong, I worship the ground that she walks on. But rumor has it that the administration initially tried to nominate a Latino to the highest court, but this noble effort was squelched by infighting between MALDEF and PRLDEF as to whether to nominate a Puerto Rican or Mexican to the bench. This time around that was not the case as everyone gathered together rallying the troops behind Sotomayor.
So when asked with a Black President in the White House whether or not racism is alive and well in the United States, you need do no more than roll back the tapes of Judge Sotomayor’s confirmation hearings and let the facts speak for themselves. But in the same breath, I have never felt more proud to be Latino in the U.S.A in seeing the caliber of the Supreme Court nominee and to witness Latinos of all races and countries of origin (with the exception of Linda Chavez – but then again, that’s a horse of a different color) gather with one voice to back this supreme lady who gives us hope.
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