Previewing the Sotomayor Battle

Rush Limbaugh may be in a tizzy over Sotomayor’s race and gender, but what do the senators who control her confirmation care about? NPR had Judiciary Committee members from both sides of the aisle weigh in. Senator John Coryn (R-TX) fretted over judicial activism, questioned remarks made in 2005 from Sotomayor about the court of appeals, calling them “troubling.” The court of appeals, Sotomayor said, is where policy is made. "We don't make law, I know,” she said. “I'm not promoting it, I'm not advocating it." She went on to say that in the court of appeals, the law is subject to interpretation. Coryn, a former Texas Supreme Court judge, said that the purpose of the appeals court is for “error correction.” Conversely, Sen. Charles Shumer, a Democrat from New York, says that Sotomayor’s comments were taken out of context: “What happens here is what the right wing often does: They will take half of the tape, show it, put it on YouTube and create an uproar.” Republicans opposed to Sotomayor, Schumer said, have “nothing to hang their hats on.”