More of the same

Though I can understand why some are happy that President Obama chose a Latina woman as his choice for supreme court justice, I fear the choice was not inspired and more of the same. Regarding Sonia Sotomayor's leanings, there is no surprise that she is a liberal, or that, as with most of the liberal justices, she seems more inclined to view her job as an opportunity to decide the direction the law should head, rather than simply apply the law as written by the legislature. In addition, Judge Sotomayor is a graduate of Yale Law School and, as such, would join a court made up of seven other judges from Harvard or Yale. Only one justice is from any other law school, Northwestern. None of this will stand in the way of her being confirmed, as the Democrats have enough votes to see to it that she is and the Republicans would not stand in her way without extreme reason, as they have repeatedly demonstrated with nominees of past Democrat presidents.

Judge Sotomayor has made other comments which have raised concerns as to her objectivity on the bench but, barring some terrible revelation, she will be confirmed. I only hope she will see the wisdom in interpreting the laws' application to each case, not trying to make law. The legislature should make law and judges should apply it or decide when a passed law is unconstitutional. I would also hope she will remember that justice is supposed to be blind, basing any decisions on the law, not who a judge favors, for any reason other than the application of the law in question. Lastly, I would like any Supreme Court Justice to remember that those who wrote our constitution favored the states and individuals having powers, unless the power in question was expressly granted to the Federal Government, not the other way around.

If Judge Sotomayor follows these approaches, Republicans will be correct to raise no objection to her confirmation.