Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson celebrated reaching the biggest accomplishment a lawyer could achieve at the White House Friday, becoming the first Black woman to sit on the nation’s highest judicial bench.
The road to confirmation for the experienced judge was soiled with what some are calling blatant disrespect. Still, many said the lack of respect would not overshadow the significant moment in American history.
“I know it wouldn’t be easy, but I know the person I nominated would be put through a painful and difficult confirmation process,” President Joe Biden said on the front lawn of the White House. “But I have to tell you, what Judge Jackson was put through was well beyond that.”
“It was verbal abuse, the anger, the constant interruptions, most vile, baseless assertions and accusations. In the face of it all, Judge Jackson showed the incredible character and integrity she possesses, poise and composure, patience and restraint, and yes perseverance and even joy.”
The U.S. Senate voted 53-47 on April 7 to select Jackson, the daughter of a retired school principal and attorney from South Miami. Jackson will replace Justice Stephen Breyer when he retires in the summer. She is a Harvard graduate who has worked as a Supreme Court clerk, public defender, district judge and appellate judge.
“It has taken 232 years and 115 prior appointments for a Black woman to be selected to serve on the Supreme Court of United States,” Jackson said on Friday. “But we’ve made it. We’ve made it, all of us, all of us.”
Even in a time when the nation has witnessed two Black Supreme Court justices, its first Black president, first female and first Black vice president, Jackson was asked to define the word “woman” and if she thought babies could be racist in her confirmation hearings.
Despite the significance, Republicans who voted against Jackson’s confirmation walked out of the chambers as supporters applauded the final tally. Some senators did not even bother to vote on the floor and dress for the occasion.
“Never forget those Republicans who walked out of the chamber in the ultimate act of hatred and disrespect as Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson was confirmed to the Supreme Court in historic fashion,” Temple University Professor Claire Smith said. “Black women for sure won’t forget. And Black women and their many allies vote.”
Republicans Sens. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma, Jerry Moran of Kansas, and Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky reportedly voted from the Republican cloakroom rather than the Senate floor. According to Politico, Paul was late, causing a nearly 25-minute delay before the Senate could call the vote. Both Paul and Graham were not wearing suits, Politico reports.
Paul, who was also criticized for holding up a Senate vote on anti-lynching law in 2020, wore khakis. He reportedly stepped inside the cloakroom, put his thumb down, closed the door, and left. The Kentucky Republican was jeered by his colleagues on the floor and peppered by political pundits for the antics.
NBC’s Yamiche Alcindor said Paul’s tardiness was an “unsettling development” that echoes some of the “indignities” and “hurdles” Black women have to face “in order to achieve what they want.”
The “unsettling” behavior was not limited to the Senate floor on Thursday. Jackson was asked about gender and race in confirmation hearings, which Jackson noted is outside the scope of her professional work as a judge.
“History will never forget the flagrant disrespect the GOP showed Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson during her confirmation hearings,” Former labor secretary Robert Reich said in a tweet Thursday.
During the second day of confirmation hearings, Sen. Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee drilled Jackson on her views on gender. She asked Jackson to comment on Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s opinion on Virginia Military Institute’s male-only admission policy when the court ruled it violated the equal protection clause. Jackson said she could not agree on the justice’s opinion because she was not familiar with the case. Blackburn then pitched her questions from another angle.
“Do you interpret Justice Ginsburg’s meaning of men and women as male and female?” Blackburn asked.
“Again, because I don’t know the case, I don’t know how I interpret it. I need to read the whole—,” Jackson said.
“Can you provide a definition of a woman?” Blackburn asked.
“Not in this context. I’m not a biologist,” Jackson replied later.
“Senator, in my work as a judge, what I do is I address disputes if there’s a dispute about a definition, people make arguments, and I look at the law, and I decide,” Jackson also added.
Waving the children’s book “Antiracist Baby,” Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas asked: “Do you agree with this book that is being taught to kids that babies are racist?”
“I have not reviewed any of those books, any of those ideas. They don’t come up in my work as a judge, which I’m respectfully here to address,” Jackson said later.
The hearings were in the past Friday for Jackson as she thanked her supporters, Biden, the vice president and the Senate, family and friends. The judge said she has received thousands of cards and notes from supporters and has kept the ones from children close to her heart.
“Our children are telling me that they see now more than ever that here in America, anything is possible,” Jackson said.
Jackson paid homage to Black civil rights leaders and trailblazers of the past, including the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and the first Black justice, Thurgood Marshall.
“In the poetic words of Dr. Maya Angelou, I do so now while bringing the gifts my ancestors gave. I am the dream and the hope of a slave,” she said.
“So, as I take on this new role, I strongly believe that this is a moment in which all Americans can take great pride. We have come a long way toward protecting our union,” Jackson said. “In my family, it took just one generation to go from segregation to the Supreme Court of the United States.”
