US Supreme Court Reverses nominee Sonia Sotomayor Race Case

Supreme Court ruled Monday that white firefighters in New Haven, Conn., were unfairly denied promotions because of their race, reversing a decision that high court nominee Sonia Sotomayor endorsed as an appeals court judge.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_supreme_court_firefighters_lawsuit

 

Yet another thing that shows she's not fit for the job.

 

Can you explain what you mean?

It is my understanding that she was following the precedent in her Circuit, which is what we want judges doing. That precedent and this case have now been overruled by the Supreme Court. That happens all the time. When a judge strays from precedent and then is overturned it is a whole nother story.

As much as people want to use this particular case to oppose or support her there is really not much in her role in this case that is special. There is much more about her background that people who both oppose and support her can point to to justify their positions.

 

It is not just this one case that is the issue. If I remember correctly, 6 out of 8 of her decisions that were taken to the Supreme Court prior to this were overturned. That is a reflection of the type of Supreme Court justice she would be.

Judges are not supposed to rule based solely upon precedence. Precedent is used to support a legal argument. If precedence was the sole basis for legal decisions, the entire legal system would be driven by whatever slick attorneys could get away with in court. To some degree it already is. U.S. Court of Appeals Judges are also supposed to take into account the interpretation of written laws and constitutionality. The case moves to the Supreme Court when constitutionality is the issue.

The white firefighters were clearly discriminated against because not enough minorities were smart enough to pass the firefighter's test. When the city threw out all of the promotions, that showed a clear intention on the part of city of the New Haven to give the promotions to a percentage of minorities based solely upon race, which would have been illegal. Sotomayor's argument was that the firefighters were not entitled to a promotion simply because they passed the test, but that was not the basic for firefighters claim. This was a discrimination case. Her point was irrelevant.

If the test was an SAT test, I can see where there could be a cultural bias. But this was a firefighter's test, which is based upon their skills, training and knowledge of the job.

My personal opposition to her is because of her view that the Second Amendment does not grant citizens the right to bear arms. I think BO intends to quietly stack the deck against gun owners with Supreme Court justices with a similar view.

Sotomayor is also a member of La Raza, the radical Hispanic group that espouses legalization of illegal Mexican aliens. La Raza also has affiliations with groups that advocate the separation of several southwestern states from the USA. This is a little surprising, given the fact that she is a Puerto Rican American, not Mexican, but it once again shows BO's preference for radicals.

She will probably still get appointed to the Supreme Court, but not without a fight. She is a bad choice for a Supreme Court justice because she does hold radical and biased views.

 

Doesn't La Raza mean the race in English?

 

browntwn, don't mind debating or explaining things to you, unlike most people here, your views are generally not made so completely up that you reject others' opinions just because they aren't the same as you.

Unfortunately tech pretty much said what I wanted lol.

The thing I don't like about precedent is that it gives judges the power to pretty much make laws which is not their area of the system.

 

I think the SCT got it right on the fireman case, I also don't like her view on the 2nd Amendment - although I am not familiar with all her opinions on that topic. That being said, I don't really have a problem with her being on the SCT. Like the United States itself, I think the court works best with a balance of views. I would not want to see a Supreme Court with 7 Liberals or 7 Conservatives.

The one thing that has always fascinated me about the Supreme Court is how we all say something is the law of the land as though it is written in stone when many times those decisions were 5-4. It was a single vote that could make the law the come out the other way.

 

The deciding vote is Clarence Thomas, an African American, and that is historic.

 

Yes. La Raza means The Race. Here in Phoenix it is a radical organization that is always accusing Sheriff Joe Arpaio of racial profiling. Their argument is that his raids to round up illegals is racially biased because he only finds illegal Mexicans and never arrests any illegal Swedes. Doh! It is not a joke. A La Raza representative actually tried to make that point.

Officially, La Raza tries to twist the meaning into The People, but that is only to hide their radicalism. The People translates to La Gente in Spanish, not La Raza.

http://www.nclr.org/section/translation/

Ideally, you want to have as many moderates as you can on the Supreme Court. I think we want people who are not pre-disposed to an opinion. Radicals like Ginsburg and a few others will always vote with a viewpoint that does not necessarily reflect constitutionality. Their opinions are based upon idealism, which should not be a factor in determining constitutionality.

Right now you have a fairly good balance in the Supreme Court, and Obama's choices for the first two replacements will not change that balance (Ginsburg and Souter) because they both vote with a liberal view. But if Obama has the opportunity to replace any of the traditional conservatives, he could tip the balance in his favor for a long time. Supreme Court justices are appointed for life, or until they decide to retire.

 

Good thing most of them decide to retire when a person that is generally in likeness to their views is in power. Generally the more left leaning justices will retire when a left leaning president is in office, and vice versa.

Its the same thing with Congress and a President. I don't really like the idea of either party controlling both the Legislative and Executive branches. You can see from the past 8 years, and currently, where that leads us.

 

Nixon (Warren), Ford (John Paul Stevens) and George Bush I (Souter) all appointed left leaning justices.

 

Not on purpose they didn't.