by Lori Lakin Hutcherson (@lakinhutcherson)
History was made moments ago when the U.S. Senate confirmed Ketanji Brown Jackson 53-47 to become the next Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States.
Jackson is the first African American woman to serve on the court and the 116th Associate Justice overall.
President Joe Biden nominated Jackson over a month ago to take over the seat of retiring Justice Stephen Breyer, for whom Jackson once clerked.
Associate Justice Jackson was born in Washington, DC and grew up in Miami, Florida. Her parents attended segregated primary schools, then attended historically black colleges and universities.
Both started their careers as public school teachers and became leaders and administrators in the Miami-Dade Public School System. When Justice Jackson was in preschool, her father attended law school.
In a 2017 lecture, Justice Jackson traced her love of the law back to sitting next to her father in their apartment as he tackled his law school homework—reading cases and preparing for Socratic questioning—while she undertook her preschool homework—coloring books.
Justice Jackson stood out as a high achiever throughout her childhood. She was a speech and debate star who was elected “mayor” of Palmetto Junior High and student body president of Miami Palmetto Senior High School.
But like many Black women, Judge Jackson still faced naysayers. When Judge Jackson told her high school guidance counselor she wanted to attend Harvard, the guidance counselor warned that Justice Jackson should not set her “sights so high.”
That did not stop Judge Jackson. She graduated magna cum laude from Harvard University, then attended Harvard Law School, where she graduated cum laude and was an editor of the Harvard Law Review.
Jackson went on to clerk for the U.S. Supreme Court, serve as a public defender, become a U.S. District Court Judge for the District of Columbia and then a Judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals.
Justice Jackson lives with her husband, Patrick, and their two daughters, in Washington, DC.
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