![](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v642/shakespeares_sister/sotomayor.jpg)
Your New Supreme Court Justice, Sonia Sotomayor.
Or, she will be, anyway, after she's sworn in—which will happen in the next couple of days.
Voting largely along party lines, the Senate on Thursday confirmed Judge Sonia Sotomayor as the 111th justice of the Supreme Court. She will be the first Hispanic and the third woman to serve on the court.She was confirmed by a vote of 68 to 31; all of the Democrats voted for her (except for Senator Kennedy, who was not present), and the extra Republican votes came from (what passes for) the GOP's moderates: Senators Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe of Maine, Judd Gregg of New Hampshire, George Voinovich of Ohio, Kit Bond of Missouri, Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, Linsday Graham of South Carolina, and Dick Lugar of Indiana (thank you, Senator Lugar!), and Mel Martinez of Florida.
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. was expected to administer the oath of office to Judge Sotomayor, 55, in the next few days, with a formal ceremony likely in September. She succeeds Justice David H. Souter, who retired in June.
Shaker Scott Madin emailed the link to this post at FiveThirtyEight, in which Nate Silver notes that of all nine Republican Senators, only one has a state with a significant Latin@ population (Mel Martinez; Florida has a 16.8% Latin@ population). The other GOP Senators from states with significant Latin@ constituencies, all 20% or more of the state population, voted against Sotomayor: John Cornyn and Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas, Jon Kyl and John McCain of Arizona, and John Ensign of Nevada.
Excellent strategery.
Especially since there was never any compelling reason to vote against Sotomayor. Wevs.
Shakesville is run as a safe space. First-time commenters: Please read Shakesville's Commenting Policy and Feminism 101 Section before commenting. We also do lots of in-thread moderation, so we ask that everyone read the entirety of any thread before commenting, to ensure compliance with any in-thread moderation. Thank you.
blog comments powered by Disqus