Posted on 05/26/2009 1:58:30 PM PDT by Free ThinkerNY
WASHINGTON (AP) - As a senior at Yale Law School, Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor forced a Washington law firm to apologize for what she considered discriminatory questions that a partner asked about her Puerto Rican heritage during a recruiting dinner.
The questions included: "Do law firms do a disservice by hiring minority students who the firms know do not have the necessary credentials and will then fire in three to four years? Would I have been admitted to the law school if I were not a Puerto Rican? Was I culturally deprived?" according to a December 1978 Washington Post article about the incident.
(Excerpt) Read more at breitbart.com ...
I could really use one of Michael Savage’s “in my day, Sonia Mayor would’ve owned a bagel shop, tops!”
I didn’t read the whole article. Did she answer the questions?
This one is a real toss up because I know what totally inappropriate a holes the partners at big law firms can be, and I have no sympathy for spoiled Yale law students either.
The fact is major law firms do recruit minority lawyers and within a few years most are no where to be seen. It’s true most people leave large firms but this is more so.
Life would be so much more simple if everybody based decisions on qualifications.
Inappropriate questions during interviews happen to all types of people. One woman physician I know was asked what her husband did for a living and when she answered, “truck driver,” was then asked, “Do you believe the difference in socioeconomic strata between your job and his will be a strain on your marriage?”
Another male physician who was being medically retired from the military was given the third degree about substance abuse, post-traumatic stress disorder, chronic back pain, etc. none of which were his problem or had anything to do with his ability to do the job he was interviewing for.
Once when applying for a mortgage I was asked how I would make the payments if my marriage didn’t work out.
Ah Geez....
Those are reasonable questions for firms to ask themselves when they decide whether to continue AA policies, but are completely inappropriate in an interview. If the firm really wanted to know whether she would have been admitted to Yale without AA, it could have asked what her LSAT score was, which would obviously be considered tacky, but far less than those questions.
They’re also stupid things to say if the firm is actually trying to recruit someone. Especially given that Shaw, Pittman isn’t exactly a top DC firm, so they’re not in a great position to be focusing on selectivity.
My ex and I had different last names and we were asked to prove that we were married. I refused saying, “Do you ask two people with the same last name to prove they are married? How do you know they aren’t brother and sister?” We still got the mortgage.
Was your husband the primary earner with the mortgage in your name only or something like that? If so it seems like a fair question, but otherwise it’s a little odd.
Once when applying for a mortgage I was asked how I would make the payments if my marriage didn’t work out.
Answer: The same way everyone else does.
As a woman applying for an associate position, I was asked why I should be hired by the law firm if I would probably stay home with my kids once I had them. Unfortunately, those types of questions were pretty common then. However, the fact that a woman or minority faced those questions does not mean she is qualified to be a Supreme Court justice.
Those questions sound awfully unsophisticated. I wonder if it was somebody’s recollection of a difficult interview and a race card played?
Correct answer: "Because you'll bill me out at $300 per hour while paying me about $50 per hour in the meantime." The claim firms always make that they don't make money off associates until the third or fourth year is obviously BS.
EXACTLY. Except, I was only being paid about $18/hour and was being billed out at $150.
OK, let’s provide our nominee with a little thought experiment. Clearly, if she felt the questioning was offensive enough to warrant an official apology, why didn’t she file suit under EEOC regulations? As a self described racial empath, was she not doing a disservice to her brothers and sisters by not putting Shaw Pittman through the legal steps necessary to remedy such transgressions?
Does she envision delivering opinions from the SCOTUS bench requiring apologies without findings of law?
I think the whole episode is an exaggeration of tacky but otherwise legal interview questions. By “exaggeration”, I mean she’s lying, and was just holding Shaw Pittman hostage to the victim culture fostered at Yale.
It just doesn’t make sense. If the questions were illegal, why not file suit? If they were legal, what’s the point of the story?
The White House has evidently been busy getting stories out.
Given your similar experience, do you now admire her willingness to call some boors to repentance?
I called out boors too. When I did, I did not get the jobs. Thus, I am not impressed with her claims of discrimination. And, my experiences do not make me qualified to be a Supreme Court justices.
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