US Supreme Court Justice: “Judges Must Be Fearless, Independent, and Sensitive to the Impact of Their Judgments”
A US Supreme Court justice said in a speech on the 28th that in order to maintain the rule of law, “judges must be fearless, independent, and sensitive to the impact of their decisions.”
Justice Sonia Sotomayor, a senior member of the Supreme Court’s progressive faction, spoke live on YouTube at Georgetown University Law Center as <WATCH LIVE: Supreme Court Justice Sotomayor speaks at Georgetown University about rule of law>.
The justice carefully but firmly made it clear to a packed auditorium at Georgetown University Law Center that her observations on the fragility of the judicial system were relevant to current events.
He lamented the fact that “some of our public leaders are lawyers who make statements that challenge the rule of law.”
His speech was conducted in the form of an interview with Georgetown University Law School Dean William M. Treanor, who mixed in questions submitted by students. He began the conversation by characterizing these questions, referring to the Trump administration’s recent efforts to punish major law firms and the court battles over the executive order’s swift enforcement.
“As our students prepare to enter the legal profession, they are confronted with truly unsettling questions about the sustainability of the profession and of law itself,” the dean said. “The most common question that comes up is the role of the courts in upholding the rule of law.”
Justice Sotomayor said she had consulted with Justice Rosalie Silverman Abella, a former member of the Supreme Court of Canada, about the duties of judges, quoting Justice Abella’s response that “judges must be independent, fearless, and protect rights, and ensure that the state respects both,” and responded, “I can’t think of a better answer.” The Supreme Court justice said of the judge’s role in restraining excesses, “Judicial independence is essential to everyone’s freedom,” and “because it is arbitrary power. And that means that anyone can be subject to injustice at the whim of someone else.” Regarding the focus of Justice Sotomayor’s remarks that day, the New York Times reported on the 28th that “Georgetown University Law School has been the subject of an unusual investigation by Ed Martin, the temporary federal prosecutor for the District of Columbia,” and that “Martin sent a letter to Dean Treanor demanding that Georgetown University Law School cease all efforts to achieve diversity, equity and inclusion.” Martin’s letter stated, “It has certainly come to my attention that Georgetown Law School continues to teach and promote DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion),” and “This is unacceptable.” The prosecutors began their investigation into the university and asked the law school dean two questions, the dean wrote in his response.
In response to the prosecutors’ questions, the Times reported, “First, have you eliminated all DEI from your school and your curriculum? And second, if you find any DEI in your courses or teaching, will you move quickly to eliminate it?”
The Times reported that Martin said his office would not hire DEI students or anyone else associated with the law school.
Trinio, a constitutional scholar and former Justice Department official, wrote in his response that “the Constitution guarantees that the government cannot dictate what Georgetown and its faculty teach and how to teach it.”
The March 6 response reads, “It inquires about Georgetown Law’s curriculum and classroom teaching, asks whether diversity, equity, and inclusion is part of the curriculum, and asserts that your office will not hire individuals from schools where you find the curriculum “unacceptable.” The First Amendment, however, guarantees that the government cannot direct what Georgetown and its faculty teachand how to teach it. The Supreme Court has continually affirmed that among the freedoms central to a university’s First Amendment rights are its abilities to determine, on academic grounds, who may teach, what to teach, and how to teach it.
“Given that the First Amendment protects the freedom of the university to determine its own curriculum and how to implement it, the constitutional violations behind these threats are clear, as are attacks on the university’s mission as a Jesuit and Catholic institution,” the president wrote.
“Race matters because of the slights, the snide remarks, the unspoken judgments that reinforce the most frightening of thoughts: ‘I don’t belong here,’” Justice Sotomayor wrote in her statement.
Sotomayor, 70, was appointed by President Barack Obama in 2009.
She pointed to the 2022 ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which overturned the constitutional right to abortion established by Roe v. Wade in 1973, saying the court has taken several wrong turns in recent years.
“I don’t think we’ve ever seen another precedent, other than Judge Dobbs, that takes away a constitutional right that we previously granted,” he said of the 1973 Wade decision, adding that “people believe in the stability of the law.” Justice Sotomayor concluded by reflecting again on judicial power, saying, “Judges need to be sensitive to how our decisions affect people,” adding, “To put it colloquially, we’re messing up your lives.” He was one of the first beneficiaries of the affirmative action that the Trump administration is trying to overturn, and he cited that experience in a blunt and passionate summary of his dissent from Michigan’s 2014 ruling banning the state’s public colleges from using race in admissions decisions.