60 Minutes: Justice Sotomayor prefers "Sonia from the Bronx"

Interviews with Supreme Court justices are rare. But tonight even more so because in 223 years, there has never been a justice like Sonia Sotomayor. 

Among other things, she's the first Hispanic on the Court, she's the daughter of Puerto Rican immigrants who settled in the Bronx -- that New York melting pot that pours out streetwise kids and American success stories.

Sotomayor, now 58 years old, calls the streets of her childhood, "My Beloved World," and that's the name of her new memoir. In her first broadcast interview, she told us that the neighborhood gave a poor girl, with a serious illness, a chance to serve and an opportunity to become one of the most powerful women in America.

Scott Pelley: This is where you grew up?

Sonia Sotomayor: In a public housing project. I lived in this one on the corner. Hold on.

Sonia Sotomayor (in Spanish): Hello. How are you?

Neighbor: Welcome to your old neighborhood.

Sonia Sotomayor (in Spanish): Thank you.]

You could believe she never left. They remember and she's never forgotten. Seems the only difference is the security detail which she really never needed in the Bronx.

Scott Pelley: You know, your brother told us that more than once in this neighborhood he got beaten up.

Sonia Sotomayor: Yep. And more than once I beat up the person who beat him up.

Scott Pelley: You stood up for your brother.

Sonia Sotomayor: Oh, you asked me the other day if I was a tough cookie, and---

A tough cookie who never crumbled at a setback.

Sonia Sotomayor: I am the most obstinate person you will ever meet. I have a streak of stubbornness in me that I think is what has accounted for some of my success in life. There is some personal need to persevere, to fight the fight. And if you just try and be stubborn about trying you can do what you set your mind to.

Sonia Sotomayor set her mind to being a judge at the age of 10. And three presidents agreed. Appointed to a federal court by the first George Bush, she was promoted to the Appeals Court by Bill Clinton. And in 2009 selected for the Supreme Court by President Obama.

Scott Pelley: Your first day working here: terrifying?

Sonia Sotomayor: Overwhelmingly terrifying. I was so anxiety ridden. I was so nervous that day that my knees knocked. And I thought everybody in the courtroom could hear them knocking.

Scott Pelley: Well, come on. You'd been a federal judge for more than 15 years at that point.

Sonia Sotomayor: I had not been a Supreme Court justice. It's a very different stage.

On this stage she's one of the most vocal questioners. And her vote most often falls on the liberal side. She helped uphold the Health Care Act and strike down tough illegal immigration statues. Back in the Bronx as a girl, she set her heart on being a cop --inspired by Nancy Drew novels and TV. But by the age of 8, the plot of her life was rewritten by diabetes.

Scott Pelley: The doctors told you because of your Type 1 diabetes--

Sonia Sotomayor: --Type 1 diabetes. At any rate--

Scott Pelley: --you couldn't be a cop.

Sonia Sotomayor: Yes, I couldn't be a cop. I figured out very quickly, watching "Perry Mason," that I could do some of the same things by being a lawyer.

[Perry Mason: Objection]

Scott Pelley: So, we are sitting in the Supreme Court today because you read "Nancy Drew" and watched "Perry Mason" on TV? CBS 60 Minute Interview (12:00 minute video)

Justice Sotomayor Throws 1st Pitch at Yankee Stadium

WH Celebrates the 'Puerto Rican girl from the Bronx' -- Justice Sonia Sotomayor

Related:
'Puerto Rican girl from the Bronx' now Justice Sotomayor - Orlando Sentinel
Justice Sotomayor celebrated at the White House - Newsday
Sotomayor grateful to nation for unlikely rise - WCAX Vermont
UFW President Gets Invite To White House For Sotomayor - KERO23 Bakersfield
Obama lauds Sotomayor’s confirmation at White House reception - WashingtonTV

Sotomayor Day 3: Wise Latina By TKO (w/an Assist From Pat Buchanan)

TKO! Game-over...Sonia Sotomayor wins. Now we'll just have wait for the vote to make it official.

Why am I so sure it's over?

Simple. The Republican's only line of attack against Sotomayor -- a veteran jurist deemed highly qualified by the American Bar Association and previously vetted and confirmed by both Republicans and Democrats -- is the anthesis of her race-baiting, facists and patronizing prosecutors inspired by the leader of the Republicans Rush Limbaugh and former Republican presidential candidate Patrick Buchanan.

Watch Cenk and Maddow rip the Buchanan for his unapologetic white supremacist campaign against Sotomayor.

It's simply beyond laughable to believe that Sotomayor is the racist, and Buchanan, the true believer in civil rights.

IMO, Their ugly strategy has backfired!

Watch how a number of Republicans will seek to distant themselves from the ugly racists of their party will now vote for Sotomayor.

Sotomayor Day 2: Wise Latina 2 -- Good Ole Boys 0

The questioning of Sonia Sotomayor began in earnest today in the U.S. Senate; unfortunately for Republican interrogators, it was a 2nd bad day. For example, Sessions of Alabama tried desperately to trip Sotomayor on issues of law that she's better informed about; and Lindsey Olin Graham of South Carolina, a fellow known for slavishly promoting John McCain's presidential bid and defending his volcanic temper, bullied on about Sotomayor's 'temperament' problem. Yeesh!

Sonia Sotomayor doesn't suffer fools lightly, but--given the high stakes and the power of her adversaries--is nonetheless forced to tolerate buffoons.

Sotomayor on Being Latina

The following passage on being Latina is from a Sonia Sotomayor's A Latina Judge’s Voice lecture (aka, The Wise Latina Speech), delivered at the California University, Berkeley School of Law in 2001:

I became a Latina by the way I love and the way I live my life. My family showed me by their example how wonderful and vibrant life is and how wonderful and magical it is to have a Latina soul. They taught me to love being a Puertorriqueña and to love America and value its lesson that great things could be achieved if one works hard for it. But achieving success here is no easy accomplishment for Latinos or Latinas, and although that struggle did not and does not create a Latina identity, it does inspire how I live my life.

Sotomayor Day 1: Score One for The Wise Latina

Sonia Sotomayor's confirmation hearings before Judiciary Committee began yesterday. It was a good day for the smart, patient and gracious Judge and a bad day for the band of wingnuts.

While a majority of the committee are conducting themselves in a thoughtful and respectful way, the same however can not be said for five of the Republicans (Cornyn of Texas, Grassley of Iowa, Kyl of Arizona, Coburn of Oklahoma) on the panel led by confirmed racist Jefferson (Jeff) Beauregard Sessions III of Alabama.

Sessions, et al., seek to: 1) tarnish President Barack Obama as someone favoring 'radical' minorities; while 2) painting Sonia Sotomayor (and LatinoJustice) as racist.

Laughable, right?

Mimicking the rants of Limbaugh, these 5 privileged White men--in full bluster--suggested that Sotomayor's views are at odds with the just and color-blind rulings of the U.S. Supreme Court.

What's weird is that these fellows are blind to their buffoonery.

Decision: Sotomayor

Sotomayor's Opening Statement

Judge Sonia Sotomayor delivers her opening statement during the first day of her confirmation hearing in the Senate Judiciary Committee. Once confirmed, Sotomayor would be the first Latino and third woman to serve on the United State Supreme Court.

Sonia Sotomayor: A New Yorker to the Core

The New York Times describes Sonia Sotomayor as “a daughter” of The Bronx who “claims the Brooklyn Bridge as her power-walking trail, the specialty shops of Greenwich Village as her grocery store, and the United States Court House as the setting for her annual Christmas party.”

Juan Sotomayor, a doctor who lives near Syracuse, says his sister Sonia is as much a New Yorker as she is a Latina (“it’s her essence”). “I always joke that her vision does not extend beyond the Hudson River.”

Ms. Sotomayor, a high-achieving student among high achievers at a Catholic high school in the Bronx, ventured outward to Princeton and Yale. Her return to New York, in which she was filled with ambition and drive as ferocious as the city itself, fit a familiar narrative. Often, friends say this image lingers in their mind’s eye: Ms. Sotomayor poring over law books and legal papers. Some days, she has said, it is hard enough to find time to sleep.