by James Oliphant and David E. Savage and updated at 5 pm.
Sonia Sotomayor completed an unlikely and historic journey today, one that began with her birth in a Bronx, New York, housing project 55 years ago and culminated in her confirmation as the Supreme Court's 111th justice.
When she is sworn into office, Sotomayor will take her place as the high court's first Hispanic and just its third woman. She was approved by a 68-31 Senate vote this afternoon after three days of debate. Nine Republicans crossed party lines to support her.
Sotomayor was nominated in May by President Obama to replace the retiring Justice David Souter. A judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals in New York for the past 11 years, she had worked her way through two Ivy League schools and worked as a Manhattan prosecutor, corporate lawyer, and federal trial judge.
But joy felt by Hispanic groups over her historic nomination quickly gave way to a firestorm, as critics seized upon a speech that Sotomayor gave to a group of students in 2001. Sotomayor suggested that her life experience as a Latina shaped her judging and her remarks became known, almost notoriously, as the "Wise Latina" speech.
"With this historic vote, the Senate has affirmed that Judge Sotomayor has the intellect, the temperament, the history, the integrity and the independence of mind to ably serve on our nation's highest court,'' Obama said today, citing her confirmation as an affirmation of the principle of finding equal justice under the law.
"It's a promise that, whether you're a mighty corporation or an ordinary American, you will receive a full and fair hearing,'' the president said at the White House. "These core American ideals -- justice, equality, and opportunity -- are the very ideals that have made Judge Sotomayor's own uniquely American journey possible.
"They're ideals she's fought for throughout her career, and the ideals the Senate has upheld today in breaking yet another barrier and moving us yet another step closer to a more perfect union.''
(President Barack Obama announced Judge Sonia Sotomayor as his nominee for the Supreme Court in an East Room ceremony at the White House on May 26. Photo above by Alex Brandon / AP)
Sotomayor's opponents charged that the speech and some of her decisions on the bench showed an inclination to use the law to favor disadvantaged minority groups. And they pointed to one case in particular, in which her court threw out a discrimination suit brought by aggrieved white firefighters in New Haven, Conn., as evidence of their claim.
But the controversy never appeared to seriously threaten her nomination.
One primary reason was that Democrats hold a near hammerlock on the Senate, defusing the possibility of a Republican filibuster almost as soon as Sotomayor was nominated.
Another was that her supporters could point to thousands of opinions in a long federal judicial career. Few, if any, showed the sort of pattern her detractors alleged existed.
Over three long days of testimony earlier this month, Sotomayor pledged "fidelity to the law" and rejected the so-called "empathy standard" that Obama had invoked when the Supreme Court vacancy arose.
The president had said that justices need to sometimes utilize "empathy" to understand the effect the court's decisions have on the lives of ordinary Americans. But Sotomayor broke with Obama over that notion, a moment her conservative critics said was particularly significant.
Still, most Republicans weren't mollified--and during this week's debate, they said they doubted Sotomayor's ability to remain impartial on the bench.
"This is a question of the true role of the judge. It is a question of whether a judge follows the law as it is written or how they wish it should be," Sen. Jeff Sessions, of Alabama, the top Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, said shortly before today's vote.
But Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont, chairnan of the committee that oversaw Sotomayor's nomination, said on the Senate floor that Sotomayor had answered her critics and proved her suitability for the court. And he called on Republicans to support the nominee to honor "our national promise."
"Judge Sotomayor's career and judicial record demonstrates that she has always followed the rule of law," Leahy said."Attempts at distorting that record by suggesting that her ethnicity or heritage will be the driving force in her decisions as a justice of the Supreme Court are demeaning to women and all communities of color."
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