Opinion: Sotomayor hearings: ‘If law was always clear, we wouldn’t have judges’
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Sen. John Cornyn, citing a speech by Sonia Sotomayor, said it appeared she suggested that judges make laws. “Can you explain what you meant by those words?” the Texas Republican asked.
Sotomayor began by saying the speech aimed to inspire students and to battle the cynicism that people sometimes express about the legal system. She then said that, no, judges don’t make law, although the public sometimes perceived judges as doing just that. She did allow that judges interpret laws but added, “We’re not lawmakers.”
Building on her comments about interpretation, she noted that Congress changes laws all the time and that society changes and evolves. Sometimes, she said, old laws must be applied to new sets of acts. This is what requires interpretation.
“If law was always clear, we wouldn’t have judges,” she said.
As for judges making judgments that are viewed as radical, as in the desegregation case of Brown vs. Board of Education, Sotomayor said that courts often head into new a direction not on their own initiative, but because they are pointed in that direction by lawyers filing and arguing cases.
-- Steve Padilla
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