Judge Sonia Sotomayor: Liar?

July 18, 2009 | Filed Under Barack Obama, Congress, Democrats/Leftists, Government, Corruption, John Armor, Judges, Liberals, President, Society/Culture, Supreme Court, The Law |

-By John Armor

Here is what Judge Sotomayor said in her opening statement to the Senate Judiciary Committee yesterday. She said, “my judicial philosophy… is simple: fidelity to the law. The task of a judge is not to make the law — it is to apply the law.”

On seven occasions, one by example in an opinion, she made clear an opposite opinion, that the outcome of a case decided by a judge of her style of decision-making, can and should be varied according to the “experience” of the judge. She wrote and published, “a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experience would more often than not reach a better conclusion that a while male who hasn’t lived that life.”

Although the White House has mounted the defense that the second quote is “taken out of context,” that is a false defense. People in the position of Judge Sotomayor of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, do not give off the cuff speeches. Her speech was prepared, written out, and supports the quote. If that were not enough, the speech was published in a journal later – another opportunity for Sotomayor to correct it, were any of its statements wrong.

These two quotes from the same person cannot be squared with one another. Has Sotomayor had a foxhole conversion, and changed her philosophy of judging at the last moment, on the verge of becoming a Justice of the Supreme Court? Her supporters on the Committee in their opening statements all supported the breadth and excellence of her judicial experience.

So, it is highly unlikely that at this precise moment that Sotomayor has honestly reversed her theory of judging to the opposite of what it was, before.

That leaves two possibilities. Either Sotomayor was lying when she made her many previous comments about a judge controlling the law, rather than merely applying it. Or, she spoke the truth then and is lying now, when she wants the Committee and the whole Senate to approve her for her final, ultimate position.

Anyone who has worked in a courtroom, lawyers and judges alike, have dealt often with witnesses who contradict themselves. Whenever a flat-out contradiction appears, the critical question is which statement is true, and which is false.

People trained in the law would apply three major understandings to the task of finding the truth. First, where are the benefits from one statement as true, rather than the other? Second, what are the circumstances of one statement than the other? And lastly, what is the demeanor of the witness in making the two statements?

Take those in reverse order. Sotomayor was most emphatic in her statement to the Judiciary Committee on Monday. But anyone who intends to sell a falsehood would know to be emphatic, and perhaps add appropriate gestures. In the two taped and televised contrary statements, she was relaxed, and casual. At Duke University, she even turned her confession of “making policy” as a judge, a joke that worked very well with her audience of law students.

Demeanor suggests that Sotomayor is lying now, not then.

The circumstances of the statements is that all were prepared for delivery, though the Duke statement was blurted out, the Ricci (New Haven fireman) case her appellate decision was the most prepared of all. Here, numbers matter. It is seven against one. This again suggests that Sotomayor is lying now, not then,

Finally, what are the stakes? If she was lying before, there is almost no payoff of any kind for the lie. But if the lie is now, the gain is a lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court.

Two conclusions seem to follow. First, Sotomayor is clearly lying, either then or now. Second, the logical conclusion is that she is lying now in order to gain an appointment to the US Supreme Court. The idea that anyone can lie his/her way onto the Supreme Court is reprehensible, but it needs to be faced.
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John Armor is a graduate of Yale, and Maryland Law School, and has 33 years practice at law in the US Supreme Court. Mr. Armor has authored seven books and over 750 articles. Armor happily lives on a mountaintop in the Blue Ridge. He can be reached at: John_Armor@aya.yale.edu

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