{The life of a Supreme Court justice would be “a little bit too monastic” for President Obama, according to an interview he gave the New Yorker about his legal legacy.}
Obama also praised the Supreme Court’s recent decision not to review lower-court rulings that struck down state prohibitions on same-sex marriage, saying he believes that the Constitution provides gays the right to marry. And he said that 81-year-old Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg “gets to decide, not anybody else, when she chooses to go” into retirement.
Obama made the remarks to the magazine’s legal correspondent, Jeffrey Toobin.
Toobin noted that the president has now nominated about a third of the nation’s federal judges — including Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan — and that on nine of the nation’s 13 appeals circuits, a majority of judges were chosen by Democratic presidents. When Obama took office, Republican appointees were a majority on 10 of the circuits.
Obama said he takes pride that he has appointed more women and minorities to the courts than any of his predecessors.
“I think there are some particular groups that historically have been underrepresented — like Latinos and Asian Americans — that represent a larger and larger portion of the population,” he said. “And so for them to be able to see folks in robes that look like them is going to be important.
“When I came into office, I think there was one openly gay judge who had been appointed. We’ve appointed 10.”
Asked to name “the best Supreme Court decision of his tenure,” Obama picked the court’s announcement this month that it would not review three appeals-court rulings that had collectively struck down bans on same-sex marriage in five states, including Virginia.
{{Washington Post}}
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