A Summer of Race Talk Gone Bad

All the conversations we had about race this summer have not turned out well.

By: Sherrilyn A. Ifill

Judge Sonia Sotomayor is the first Latina Supreme Court justice. The Cambridge police dropped the charges against Professor Henry “Skip” Gates, an action supported by the mounting evidence that he was the subject of a false and racially charged arrest.

But without a doubt, this has been a bad summer for conversations on race. It began with the nomination and hearings for Judge Sotomayor to be elevated to the U.S. Supreme Court. As soon as the first Latina was nominated, accusations were hurled, stereotyping the nominee as intellectually dull and temperamental. Then for good measure, Republicans added the charge that the nominee was racist. Her now famous “wise Latina” comments—part of the judge’s thoughtful and candid discussion of how judges are shaped by their backgrounds—were held out as evidence that Judge Sotomayor would be biased on the bench in favor of Latinos. The discussion around the judge’s confirmation hearings focused on pushing back against these baseless characterizations. Judge Sotomayor’s observations about how personal experiences may affect how a judge views the law could have opened a productive discussion about the importance of racial and gender diversity in our courts, or even a thoughtful and more subtle conversation about judging that moved away from the facile image of judges as “umpires” who merely “call balls and strikes”—a concept advanced by John G. Roberts Jr. at his confirmation hearings to become chief justice.

A Summer of Race Talk Gone Bad....