Diversity In The Fiduciary



Front Row: Associate Justices; Clarence Thomas, Antonin Scalia, Chief Justice John Roberts, Associate Justices Anthony Kennedy, Ruth Bader Ginsberg
Back Row: Associate Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Stephen Breyer, Samuel Alito, Elena Kagan

 From the Associated Press - President Barack Obama is moving at a historic pace to try to diversify the nation's federal judiciary: Nearly three of every four people he has gotten confirmed to the federal bench are women or minorities. He is the first president who hasn't selected a majority of white males for lifetime judgeships.  Of the 98 Obama nominees confirmed to date, the administration says 21 percent are African-American, 11 percent are Hispanic, 7 percent are Asian-American and almost half — 47 percent — are women. By comparison, of the 322 judges confirmed during George W. Bush's presidency, 18 percent were minorities and 22 percent were female. Of the 372 judges confirmed during Clinton's terms, 25 percent were minorities and 29 percent were women. In these figures, some judges fit into more than one category.  The president won Senate confirmation of the first Latina to the Supreme Court, Justice Sonia Sotomayor. And with the confirmation of Justice Elena Kagan, he increased the number of women on the high court to three for the first time.  Thurgood Marshall became the first African-American to serve on the Supreme Court in 1967, and Sandra Day O'Connor was the first woman to be elevated to the nation's highest court in 1981.  "The more diverse the courts, the more confidence people have in our judicial system," said Nan Aron of the liberal Alliance for Justice. "Having a diverse judiciary also enriches the decision-making process."  Obama also has doubled the number of Asian-Americans sitting on the federal bench, including adding Denny Chin to the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York as the only active Asian federal appeals court judge. There currently are 14 Asian-American federal judges on the 810-judge roster.  Having said this, there are still some narrow-minded critics who refuse to accept the fact that these minorities are more than qualified to deserve these positions.  Then again, some of these same people think we vote for people of color running for public office just because they are people of color.  We accept the fact that hatred causes people to be this blind.