After an election promise, after weeks of speculation, after the unveiling of a short list. After more than 200 years, after 108 white men, 2 black men, 4 white women and after a Latina woman, there will be – if confirmed by the US Senate – Ketanji Brown Jackson.
Posted at 11:00 a.m.
Last Friday, President Joe Biden appointed Mr.me Brown Jackson to the United States Supreme Court. In addition to having a distinguished career, this accomplished judge and graduate of Harvard University is also a black woman. I don’t fancy having to mention it, despite being puffed up with pride.
Because to mention it is to choose, first and foremost, to identify Ketanji Brown Jackson through the intersectionality that makes her an exception within this influential institution. Perhaps, like me, she would prefer that we see in her, above all else, the great jurist that she is and the many accomplishments that prove it. But she doesn’t have that luxury. At least not yet.
The arrival of Ketanji Brown Jackson would mean that there would ultimately be better representation of the American social fabric in the most important legal body in the United States.
This nomination is fundamental, too, because blacks do not represent a monolithic group; to have only the very conservative Justice Clarence Thomas on the Supreme Court of the United States has never been satisfying, representative, or particularly edifying.
Know better, understand better
There is something extraordinary about the appointment of justices to the Supreme Court of the United States. The staging has the air of reality TV – a kind ofamerican idol where all the candidates wear gowns. That’s true for Ketanji Brown Jackson and others who were on the same shortlist as her, and it was true for their contemporary predecessors.
The process is always the same. The name of the named possibilities circulates, then begins the deliberation in the public opinion. We learn everything from the candidates. In addition to their professional background, we know with whom they share their life, we learn the names of their children, we know their favorite aria and their rigorous sports routine.
This perception of transparency and proximity perhaps explains, in part, the attachment that Americans – even those who do not work in the field of law – have for some of the judges who sit on the Supreme Court.
Could it be that, despite our admiration, it is an attachment that we – those who do not work in the field of law – do not necessarily have, here, for our justices of the Supreme Court of Canada? It’s a shame, because even if the mechanisms of the two courts are different, the prestige of the title and the importance of the role of judge and of the institution are just as important.
Last June, journalist Paul Wells signed a superb portrait of Justice Rosie Abella, on the eve of her retirement from the Supreme Court of Canada. The magazine Maclean’s had made it his frontispiece. This all-too-rare American-style media treatment has its advantages. For the minimally initiated like me, it is an opportunity to better understand the functioning of the court and the legal issues of the country. It is also a way to get to know these brilliant guardians of our rights better and, possibly, to inspire – in an unsuspected way – a new generation of lawyers. As Ketanji Brown Jackson will be able to do, if she is confirmed as a justice of the Supreme Court of the United States and if, like some who preceded her, she plays the game of granting interviews to popular and influential media international, like the magazine People or Stephen Colbert’s late-night show, for example.
To see Ketanji Brown Jackson, to hear him on different forums also has the important power and role of normalizing the presence of black women in decision-making and influential positions.
Better understand, get things done
U.S. Supreme Court rulings have often led to significant societal advances beyond U.S. borders long after the rulings have been rendered. let’s think about Brown v. Board of Education in 1954, on the unconstitutionality of segregation in public schools or on the decision of Roe v. wadeon the right to abortion which, 50 years later, is still making headlines.
Rulings of this powerful tribunal have become influential flashpoints cultures in the United States and internationally, which have transcended the confines of justice. In particular because some of them have been brought to the screen and the cinema remains an important vector. let’s think about the movie Gideon’s Trumpetbased on the judgment of Gideon v. wainwright or at Hustler Magazine c. Fallwellwhich inspired the film The People vs. Larry Flynt or at the movie lovingwho staged the story of the decision loving v. Virginia- on intermarriage laws.
So many far-reaching, multi-impact shutdowns, without the input or perspective of at least one black woman? The arrival of Ketanji Brown Jackson and the influence she will have are late. Hasn’t the time come for the Supreme Court of Canada, too, to be more up-to-date and representative?