Next week, we will celebrate Martin Luther King Day and Dr. King’s extraordinary contributions to the civil and economic rights of more than 120 million people of color in the United States. During this week recognizing civil rights, President Obama will celebrate his second inauguration and address the nation on its future.
In examining the past and the future for America, no president has yet considered the importance of justice, and the symbols of justice, for our growing Asian American population of almost 20 million. For example, during America’s 223 year Supreme Court history, there have been 112 United States Supreme Court justices. Yet, over this long history, no Asian American has ever been appointed or even nominated.
Today, our Supreme Court is considered relatively diverse since it includes a Latina, an African American, Jewish Americans, and Catholics. Fifty years ago, there were no minorities on the Supreme Court and the appointments of Catholics were rare. However, our nation is changing and former President Lyndon Johnson recognized this when he appointed the first African-American Justice, the great civil rights leader Thurgood Marshall, to the Supreme Court.
President Obama followed this tradition of diversity in his first term by naming our nation’s first Latina to the court, Justice Sonia Sotomayor.
During the President’s second term, four of the nine justices could retire, since they are presently between 74 and 79 years of age. Some groups have called for the consideration of a constitutional amendment that requires mandatory retirement with a lifetime pension once a justice reaches the age of 75 and has served at least 15 years on the court. The benefit of this approach is that regular turnover at the Supreme Court would enable its decisions to be culturally responsive to the ever-changing American demography.
In the upcoming year, Asian American organizations across the country will request that President Obama prioritizes the appointment of a highly qualified Asian American to the court. There are approximately 42,000 Asian American lawyers across the country, many of whom are highly qualified, such as Justice Goodwin Liu of the California Supreme Court.
Asian Americans are a Relative Rarity within our Federal Court System
In his first term of office in 1975, Governor Jerry Brown made diversity a high priority. In his present third term, he has continued this commitment. That is why a majority of today’s California’s Supreme Court justices are people of color and over half are women. This includes the first Filipina-American Chief Justice, Tani Cantil-Sakauye.
Recently, Governor Brown appointed a highly qualified Asian American Berkeley Law School Professor, Goodwin Liu, to the California Supreme Court where he joined three other Asian Americans (a majority of the seven California justices are Asian American).
Over the next two years, President Obama has the opportunity to appoint almost 200 (184) federal district court and federal appellate court judges. This will provide the President with many chances to promote diversity and justice among Asian Americans, since there are virtually no Asian Americans among our 850 federal district court and appellate court judges.
Of the very few Asian American federal judges, there is a tiny number of Indian Americans, Japanese Americans, and Chinese Americans. However, there are almost no Korean American, Vietnamese American, Filipino American or any other Southeast Asian American federal judges. For example, there are no federal judges from the Indonesian, Thai, Hmong, Burmese, Cambodian and Laotian communities.
As it meets with the White House and key federal officials, the National Asian American Coalition will urge the President to rectify the scales of justice and to promote fair representation within the federal court system by ensuring that at least 10% of new federal court appointees are Asian American. This will be an important first step in ensuring that our federal court system is as diverse as the California state court system.
Last week, six Asian American leaders representing a diverse group of Asian Americans, including the National Asian American Coalition, sent a letter to the President urging him to expedite the appointment of diverse Asian Americans and to become the first president to appoint an Asian American to the United States Supreme Court. However, this will only occur if our diverse Asian American communities come together and make this matter a high priority for President Obama.
(Faith Bautista & Shalini Swaroop)
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Faith Bautista is the President & CEO of the National Asian American Coalition. Shalini Swaroop is the Senior Counsel of the National Asian American Coalition.
