Confirmation Hearings Open for Judge Sonia Sotomayor, 1st Latina Nominated to Supreme Court

Jenny Rivera, Professor at the CUNY School of Law and the founding director of the its Center on Latino and Latina Rights and Equality. She served as a law clerk to Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor in 1993-94 when Sotomayor was a Manhattan federal court judge.

Juan Gonzalez,

I want to turn to the record of Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions, who’s leading the charge against Judge Sotomayor. In Monday’s hearing Sessions warned of a “Brave New World where words have no true meaning” and “a judge is free to push his or her own political and social agenda.”

Well Sessions has recently become the ranking member on the Senate Judiciary Committe, after Pennsylvania Senator Arlen Specter left the Republican Party. Sessions’ key position on the committee is remarkable considering his own history.

Twenty-three years ago, Sessions was in the seat of the nominee. President Ronald Reagan nominated Sessions to be a U.S. district Judge in 1986. At that time, Reagan had already appointed some 200 judges throughout the federal system, and republicans held the majority on committee.

But Sessions became only the second man in fifty years to not be recommended for confirmation. Two Republicans, including Arlen Specter, voted against him. His fellow Senator from Alabama, Howell Heflin, also voted against him citing “reasonable doubts” over Sessions’ ability to be “fair and impartial.”

Sessions once described the NAACP and American Civil Liberties Union as “un-American” and “Communist-inspired” because they “forced civil rights down the throats of people.” Critics also testified that they had once heard Sessions say he admired the Ku Klux Klan.

This is an archival news clip from 1986 with Bob Schieffer of CBS News reporting on the Senate’s rejection of Sessions as a federal judge.

CBS News clip from 1986.

For more on Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions I’m joined now from Washington, DC by Sarah Wildman, a senior correspondent for The American Prospect and a regular contributor to the New York Times and the Guardian (UK) opinion pages. In 2002 she wrote a critical profile of Sessions for the The New Republic, “Closed Sessions.” Earlier this year she wrote a piece for the UK Guardian on Sessions’ new role as ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee called “Sessions’ Checkered Past.”

Sarah Wildman, senior correspondent for the American Prospect and a regular contributor to the New York Times and the Guardian (UK) opinion pages. In 2002 she wrote a critical profile of Senator Jeff Sessions for the The New Republic, Closed Sessions. Earlier this year she wrote a piece for the UK Guardian on Sessions’ new role as ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, Sessions’ Checkered Past.

Jenny Rivera,