By The Editors
Washington, D.C. — February 22 — In a closely-watched case involving the hiring of black firefighters in Chicago, the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. today urged the U.S. Supreme Court to prevent mis-interpreted technical rules from blocking the correction of discrimination in employment.

By Leslie Proll
When President Obama took office last January, hopes were high that the right wing’s long stronghold on the federal courts had come to an end. LDF and other civil rights advocates were eager for a new day when fair and impartial judges would once again be nominated and confirmed in large numbers.

By John Payton
A year ago, we could barely contain our excitement as we contemplated a historic achievement. Barack Obama had won a decisive victory. There was widespread enthusiasm for his Presidency. Right after the election, Gallup reported that 68 percent of the public was proud that Obama was President. His choices of Senator Hillary Clinton to be Secretary of State, of Eric Holder to be Attorney General and of Robert Gates to remain as Secretary of Defense were well received. His Inaugural speech was brilliant. We were looking forward to acknowledging and confronting fundamental problems that have plagued our society for decades.

By Stacey Patton
The Supreme Court’s function is to solve important questions of the law by resolving cases and controversies. So what happens when it decides to hear fewer cases? And what happens when the Court hears even fewer cases on civil rights claims?

By The Editors
On Thursday, August 6, the Senate confirmed Judge Sonia Sotomayor, whose arc of achievements embodies one of the most cherished facets of the American Dream, as the newest Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court.

By The Editors
With the U.S. Senate set to vote next week on the appointment of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court, the top Senate leadership and representatives from nearly a score of civil rights groups met this week in Washington to reiterate their fervent support of the nomination.

By Lee A. Daniels
I don’t mean to be flippant. But, as I’ve watched Judge Sonia Sotomayor, President Obama’s nominee for the U.S. Supreme Court, testifying this week before the Senate Judiciary Committee, that snippet of the tune sung to salute the newly-crowned winner of the Miss America beauty pageant, kept cycling through my mind.

By The Editors
John Payton vigorously defended Judge Sonia Sotomayor’s fitness to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court yesterday in a charged debate with conservative commentator Patrick Buchanan on the MSNBC program “Hardball with Chris Matthews.”

By The Editors
Describing her as “one of the most qualified nominees … for the Supreme Court in decades,” the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund (LDF) has “strongly” endorsed Federal Judge Sonia Sotomayor to be the Court’s newest Associate Justice.

By Cheryl I. Harris and Kimberly West-Faulcon
The Supreme Court’s narrow ruling in Ricci declaring that the City of New Haven discriminated against white firefighters implicates more than just one case. It is actually the latest salvo in the war being waged by the Court’s conservative majority to redefine racial discrimination as any and all race-conscious action—even when taken to avoid race discrimination.