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Legal Commentary

: Balkinization

Judge Sotomayor as Legal Realist

By Jack M. Balkin

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The Wall Street Journal has an article on whether Judge Sotomayor is a legal realist. The following has been circulating in the blogosphere:

Sotomayor also claimed: "For me, a very special part of my being Latina is the mucho platos de arroz, gandoles y pernir -- rice, beans and pork -- that I have eaten at countless family holidays and special events."
This has prompted some Republicans to muse privately about whether Sotomayor is suggesting that distinctive Puerto Rican cuisine such as patitas de cerdo con garbanzo -- pigs' feet with chickpeas -- would somehow, in some small way influence her verdicts from the bench.
Curt Levey, the executive director of the Committee for Justice, a conservative-leaning advocacy group, said he wasn't certain whether Sotomayor had claimed her palate would color her view of legal facts but he said that President Obama's Supreme Court nominee clearly touts her subjective approach to the law.

I suppose this confirms the Wall Street Journal account: Judge Sotomayor might believe that a judge's decisions turn on what she had for breakfast.

Full post as published by Balkinization on May 28, 2009 (boomark / email).