CAPITAL CULTURE: Sotomayor adds celebrity to court
Headline News
Apparently, no one told Sonia Sotomayor that Supreme Court justices are supposed to be circumspect, emerging from their marble palace mainly to dispense legal wisdom to law schools, judges' conferences and lawyers' meetings.
Since becoming the first Hispanic justice, Sotomayor has mamboed with movie stars, exchanged smooches with musicians at the White House and thrown out the first pitch for her beloved New York Yankees. A famous jazz composer even wrote a song about her: "Wise Latina Woman."
In short, Sotomayor has become a celebrity — all without having made a single major decision at the nation's highest court.
It's not that other justices don't have their own particular glamour.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Antonin Scalia — both opera lovers — recently had roles in the opening performance of "Ariadne auf Naxos" for the Washington National Opera. Other justices have done tours to promote their books.
But that kind of fame rarely reaches the man on the street.
Few Americans can name most of the justices. "Many, many, many more Americans can name the Seven Dwarfs than they can the people on the Supreme Court," said Bob Thompson, professor of television and popular culture at Syracuse University.
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