Mr. President, I come to the floor because today has been a good day for our country. Earlier today, the U.S. Senate voted to confirm Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to the U.S. Supreme Court. Not only did this Chamber make history, we also…
Mr. President, I come to the floor because today has been a good day for our country. Earlier today, the U.S. Senate voted to confirm Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Not only did this Chamber make history, we also bore witness--in a small but powerful way--to the bending of the moral arc towards justice. We realized the promise of America: the promise that every child--regardless of their skin color, their ethnicity, or the ZIP code they are born into--can rise to their highest station in life. We cemented our fundamental belief that, here in America, if you reach further and aim higher, anything is possible.
I submit to my colleagues that the story of Judge Jackson is the story of our great Nation. Together with her impeccable credentials and evenhanded record, there was simply no reason to oppose the confirmation of such a talented, well-qualified, and fair-minded jurist. It is why I could not have been prouder to cast my vote, a vote on behalf of New Jerseyans everywhere, to elevate her to the highest Court in the land.
Judge Jackson has lived a life in the mold of the great strivers in our history. Her nomination alone was a testament to the progress-- often deferred or denied--but nonetheless the progress we have achieved on our 246-year struggle for a more perfect union.
I could not be prouder that we etched it into stone and confirmed her to the Court, proving to women and girls everywhere that, if they work hard and reach for the stars, they too can be one of the nine guardians entrusted by the Constitution to ensure equal justice under law for all people. As we celebrate this historic moment, consider the senior quote ascribed to Judge Jackson in her high school yearbook: ``I want to go into law and eventually have a judicial appointment.''
As we stand here, after extending her the judicial appointment of all judicial appointments, it may seem predestined. It may have seemed like this day is the culmination of her destiny. But to hear Judge Jackson tell it herself, one realizes that, in fact, none of it was predetermined. None of it was fate. Simply put, it was the brilliance and grit of a young woman from South Florida--and the love of her family who surrounded her--that made this vote possible. As a student at Miami Palmetto Senior High School, Ms. Ketanji Brown was class president, chess club president, and a star on the powerhouse speech and debate team.
Her parents, Ellery and Johnny Brown, were teachers who taught her the value of education as they rose to lead their peers as a principal and chief counsel for Miami-Dade County schools. In addition to public education, her family is steeped in a law enforcement background. Her younger brother worked in undercover drug stings for the Baltimore Police Department. One of her uncles was a detective attached to a sex crimes unit, while another uncle was Miami's chief of police.
And yet it is the experience of seeing a third uncle, her Uncle Thomas, sentenced to life in prison for a nonviolent cocaine offense, that rounds out her early understanding of our criminal justice system. In 2005, Judge Jackson would eventually set in motion a chain of events that ended with President Obama commuting her uncle's sentence. But before that could happen, before she joined major law firms and the Federal public defender's office--before she served as Vice Chair of the U.S. Sentencing Commission and as a judge on the Federal bench--she was first a daughter, a sister, and a niece.
And it is there, in the pages of Judge Jackson's story, as a product of public schools who saw our country's justice system up close, where we can find her judgment. It is there where we can find the reasons for my colleague, Senator Booker, to declare to her on national television: ``You have earned this spot. You are worthy. You are a great American.''
So much ink has been spilled about the historic nature of Judge Jackson's nomination and now confirmation. She stood before the Senate as a nominee descendant from slaves who grew up listening to her parents' stories of attending segregated schools, a nominee who was once told by a guidance counselor that she shouldn't set her sights so high when applying to Harvard; a nominee who not only graduated as the second generation in her family to earn a college degree but who silenced naysayers and doubters alike by graduating, with honors, from both Harvard College and Harvard Law School.
Simply put, soon-to-be Justice Jackson belongs on the highest Court in the land. Her confirmation is a milestone in the grand tapestry of our country--not only because she has broken barriers as the first African-American woman and the first to have served as a public defender, but rather, it is because she is supremely qualified to interpret our Constitution and hear cases on their merit. When she is sworn in, Justice Jackson will have more experience as a trial court judge than any of her colleagues on the Court. In fact, she will be the second Justice ever to have experience at all three levels of our Federal judiciary. The first, a legal trailblazer in her own right, is Justice Sonia Sotomayor.
It is therefore only fitting that, as I have thought about what this day means for our country, I am reminded of the parallels between this historic nomination and the historic nomination for Justice Sotomayor. Back then, in 2009, I said, ``when she takes her seat on the United States Supreme Court, we will only need to look at the portrait of the justices to see how far we've come as a nation, who we really are as a people, and what our founders intended us to be.''
Those words have never rung more true. A woman who, when the Constitution was written, would have counted in the eyes of the law as three-fifths of her fellow Americans, will now carry out justice for every single citizen who calls this Nation home. In the midst of disgusting attacks, racial dog whistles turned into foghorns, and gross mischaracterizations of her record, Judge Jackson maintained a calm demeanor throughout her nomination with almost superhuman poise.
For my colleagues who opposed her nomination today, yet voted to confirm her to the Sentencing Commission, the district court, and to the appeals court just last year, I leave them to iron out their double standards. But to all who rejoice in what is to come, when Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson will soon place her hand on the Bible and takes her solemn oath of office, I submit the following:
More than ever before, the newest portrait of our nine
Supreme Court justices will more clearly reflect who we are
as a nation and what we stand for as a fair, just, and
hopeful people.
Unlike other nations, those united by a singular history, language, and culture, this nation--our Nation--is united by our diversity. It is evident in our national motto--the one stamped on every coin in our pocket and etched on the ceiling of our Capitol dome, E pluribus Unum: out of many one. And it is despite these differences that our country comes together as a vast melting pot, one forged in common values and an ideal of freedom that stands as a beacon to the world.
As Judge Jackson takes her rightful place on the Supreme Court, the full realization of that ideal is closer than it has ever been. I know this for I have lived it--as Judge Jackson has lived it--and I feel it, as so many others in this country have felt it. I stand here, the son of Cuban refugees, the first in my family to attend college, and now, in a nation of 330 million, as one of only 100 Members of the U.S. Senate.
It is indeed possible, my colleagues, to make our ancestors' wildest dreams come true.
And so, in closing, as I reflect on our vote earlier today, I can't help but feel joy for my three granddaughters: Evangelina, Ofelia, and Olivia. Granted, they are still young; my oldest is barely out of pre- K. But each one of them will grow up knowing that, thanks to Justices like Sandra Day O'Connor, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and now Ketanji Brown Jackson, there isn't a single thing they can't accomplish. Let their dreams be our dreams today. Let every child in America look at their parents the way that Judge Jackson's daughter looked at her during her confirmation hearing.
Let there be no barriers to what is possible now that Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson has been confirmed to the Supreme Court.