With only days until Senate confirmation hearings begin on the nomination of Elena Kagan to the Supreme Court, the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund (LDF) has released a report examining the nominee’s civil rights record.

By Justice David H. Souter
Former Supreme Court Justice David H. Souter recently received a honorary degree from Harvard University, his undergraduate and law school Alma Mater, and delivered the Commencement Address. His speech was a concerted criticism of the conservative judicial doctrine of “originalism,” which contends judicial decisions should be rendered by adhering to a strict reading of the Constitution.

By Stacey Patton
This week LDF won another significant victory in the Supreme Court. In Lewis v. Chicago, the Court ruled unanimously that the City of Chicago can be held responsible for each time it used a hiring practice that arbitrarily blocked qualified black applicants from employment.

In April Justice Stephen G. Breyer of the U.S. Supreme Court spoke at the New York Historical Society about the historical and present-day importance of the infamous Dred Scott decision, which played a critical role in bringing about the Civil War. We cannot think of a more fitting momemt to contemplate Justice Breyer’s words than on Memorial Day, which began in 1868 in the North as a day to pay homage to the Civil War dead.

After years fighting for justice, qualified African-American job applicants will finally have a fair opportunity to land a job with the Chicago fire department. Today the Supreme Court ruled unanimously that the City of Chicago can be held accountable for each and every time it used a hiring practice that arbitrarily blocked qualified minority applicants from employment.

By Vernon E. Jordan, Jr.
In New York State Thurgood Marshall Day –appropriately — also marks the anniversary of a great American milestone.

The United States Supreme Court declared that children convicted of non-homicide offenses cannot be sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. The Court concluded that because adolescents are, by nature, less culpable than adults and because life without parole is an extreme sentence which is rarely imposed on teenagers, it is cruel and unusual punishment to sentence a child who has not killed to life without possibility of parole

By Damon Hewitt
Fifty-six years after the U.S. Supreme Court rendered its landmark decision in Brown v. Board of Education, America is in a state of educational emergency. Many students attend schools where they are more likely to be suspended or expelled than to receive a high quality education. In terms of high school graduation, the most basic of all indicators of academic achievement, some students stand no better than a coin flip of a chance.

The NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund congratulates Ms. Kagan on her nomination and calls upon the Senate to consider the nomination expeditiously.

By Olympia Duhart
His visit demonstrated the commitment Justice Stevens typically displays to inclusion and access. It was also consistent with Justice Stevens’ alignment with “the little guy.”