Sonia Sotomayor Quotes

Esas cosas no se pueden medir ni pesar. No puedes decir: esta cantidad de amor equivale a esta cantidad de sufrimiento. No son opuestos que se cancelan mutuamente; ambos son verdaderos al mismo tiempo.

I don't believe we should bend the Constitution under any circumstance. It says what it says. We should do honor to it.

I've known how to control my anger, but that doesn't mean I don't feel it. Page 190

Argument by argument, the majority invents immunity through brute force. Under scrutiny, its arguments crumble. To start, the majority’s broad “official acts” immunity is inconsistent with text, history, and established understandings of the President’s role. Moreover, it is deeply wrong, even on its own functionalist terms. Next, the majority’s “core” immunity is both unnecessary and misguided. Furthermore, the majority’s illogical evidentiary holding is unprecedented. Finally, this majority’s project will have disastrous consequences for the Presidency and for our democracy.

[A]lthough wisdom is built on life experience, the mere accumulation of years guarantees nothing.

Next to the monitor that showed the jobs queuing to run on the computer was a metal post that seemed to serve no purpose. It was a while before someone explained it to me: after repeatedly replastering the wall, the administration had decided to install the post for the convenience of frustrated students, who invariably needed something to kick when their code crashed.

Achievement was all very well, but it was the process, not the goal, that was most important. ON

It seems history matters to this Court only when it is convenient.

America has a deeply confused image of itself that is in perpetual tension. We are a nation that takes pride in our ethnic diversity, recognizing its importance in shaping our society and in adding richness to its existence. Yet, we simultaneously insist that we can and must function and live in a race and color-blind way that ignore these very differences that in other contexts we laud. That tension between "the melting pot and the salad bowl" – a recently popular metaphor used to described New York's diversity – is being hotly debated today in national discussions about affirmative action.

Although wisdom is built on life experiences, the mere accumulation of years guarantees nothing.

virtue in obscurity is rewarded only in heaven.

Books are keys that unlock the wisdom of yesterday and open the door to tomorrow

And he was utterly untainted by emotion.

In examining witnesses, I learned to ask general questions so as to elicit details with powerful sensory associations: the colors, the sounds, the smells, that lodge an image in the mind and put the listener in the burning house.

This was not a man who relished chitchat. But being capable of talking up anybody, I proceeded to ask him to tell me a bit about his background, what he’d liked about each of his jobs.