it is one area where he and sonia sotomayor are very simmlar.oth are really hard workers who want to read and digest everything, go through all the briefs. she has finished her first year and i would ssy she has voted very similarly to david souter. on the moderate to liberal side on all big issues. it will be awhileebefore we know down the road whether she -pis really different. the court -- i cannot think of any case this year for you can say the accord was different because david souter was gone and sonia sotomayor took his place. host: presumably justice stevens has just about pack up and is moving out of his offices sometime soon. what would you say has been his influence on the court and be on the court here in washington? guest: he has been a remarkable justice for 34 years. he is somebody who had a tremendous influence inside the court. he has not made himself into a public figure. he is not someone who has gone out to give speeches, done c- span to abuse. he has not written books. -- or done c-span interviews. all the justices had a hig

you mentioned that certain justices came to see this, including sonia sotomayor. what about justice thomas? >> he was not there. tavis: where was i? [laughter] >> you were waiting for me to take you out. tavis: i was just asking. a little birdie told me that this show is even better now than when i saw this on broadway. >> somebody said this to you? tavis: i cannot imagine this. >> this is certainly much deeper and much richer, because i had a couple of years to let this grow inside me, and having grown to washington, where all of this happened, has added something to this. the marshall family has graced me with their presence many times. and they have given me so much loved, and this has been enriching the performance. this is much deeper and i think that you will see this. tavis: what was it that drew you to this material? >> when i was reading the material, i was learning so much. i had no idea that, for example, he was arguing brown vs. the board of education. i did not believe that he was the first african-american supreme court justice. and learning that he

and this year we saw unusual combinations among the justices where sonia sotomayor could be with anynumber of different alignments and with elena kagan coming in, i think will you see more of that, for ten years the supreme court didn't change. now we have had john roberts, sam alito, sonia sotomayor and presumably elena cagar. >> in a short period. >> over the past 15 years that a big shake-up in the last five in particular, and so i think that's a good thing. if the court is just perceived as a bunch of idea logs, okay, it will be 5-4 and we'll see what way kennedy goes. i think it is progress just getting that renewed energy. >> brown: that does mean naomi that a lot of this is a work in progress because a lot of these people are still relatively new? >> i think that that is right. i mean if elena kagan is confirmed we'll have four new justices in a span of five years which as tom said is a tremendous amount of turnover. and with the new chief justice i think the new composition of the court is just starting to take shape and it will be very interesting to watch how things do shak

there's supreme court nominee sonia sotomayor saying a wise latina may have advantages over a white judgethe mainstream media all too often ignores these stories. glenn beck has called president obama -- >> a racist. >> reporter: rush limbaugh has called liberal policies a form of reparation. there have been plenty of controversies that paint conservatives as racists. senate candidate george allen calling an indian man this name -- >> macaca or whatever his name is. >> and more recently allegations of racial epithets hurled at black members of congress during the health care debate -- >> have been called the "n" word, have been spat on. >> reporter: and allegations of racist signs held aloft during tea party rallies. a presidency hailed by many as post-racial has turned out to be anything but. dan harris, abc news. >>> well, it seems one politician is keeping his mouth shut. rod blagojevich declared yesterday he won't testify in his own corruption trial. >> this coming from the man who said from the start that he would tell his side of the story. but why now the change of heart? barbara p

last year when the nomination of sonia sotomayor to the supreme court came up and the comments about the wise latino woman comments were released you tweeted this. white man racist nominee would be forced to withdraw. latino woman racist should also withdrew. you later apologized. why so quick to call people racists? >> what i said about sotomayor i think still stands which was the statements she made were cheerly racist. now, i don't know again in her heart whether she is a racist but you go back and look at her exact quotes and they were quotes if you put in white male instead of latina you would say that was racist. when you look at what happened the other night i was reacting directly to somebody who had been fired by the white house and the secretary of agriculture based on a clip which had been shown and my point is one that i think you would agree with, which is there is no room in america for a latino or black racist or white racist or native american racist. we are either color blind or we are not color blind. >> chris: let me bring in governor dean. >> let's be blunt about

sonia sotomayor saying she was a wise latina and ruling against white firemen who didn't get promotionsecause of their race. it has been nonstop, nonstop, nonstop. >> but why? >> i think we found out from the journal in this large part and that's liberal journalists, hundreds of them, chitchatting about how to protect obama and, you know, they are openly saying that we are in trouble ask we need to distract from what's going on. let's just randomly call the conservative racist. so liberals do this all the time to distract from what's going on. >> i'm guessing you don't agree with that, tanya. >> speaking of distracts, ironic. with all due respect to ann, a lecture on race relations from someone that says she does many need to be perfected. moving past that, i think when you look at this incident let's not get distracted of what happened. a woman's whose father was murdered by a white farmer which there was never an indictment, never prosecution, was telling a story about racial redemption. and what we saw happened on the right, an dry breibart ran with the story. i expect selected it it

. >> as you watch this process, how much different has it been from the nomination of sonia sotomayor? >> it has played out similarly in the sense that the democrats are lining up for her and so far whoever is announced in the republicans have been pretty, less around voting against her so far. 14 republicans have said they will vote against her. >> aside from the fact that the committee members are able to call for a delay of one week, what in particular was senator sessions worried about with her record? >> he voiced some new concerns on tuesday about the solicitor general participating in a challenge to the health-care overhaul constitutionality. republicans submitted a letter asking for additional clarification about whether she participated in any constitutionality. like that she have to respond to that letter? >> sought -- so far the white house spokesman has not indicated whether or not there will be some kind of response before next tuesday. >> what can you tell us about the timetable from there on out? >> the expectation is that she will be voted out of the committee and to t

conventional wisdom is that yes, of course she will be confirmed but maybe with fewer votes than sonia sotheby's -- sotomayor. >> i think that is true. she had the advantage of being the first latina, first hispanic supreme court justice. the support of mel martinez, cuban american in florida, he has left the senate since, defeat bid george lemieux, he has political ambitions of his own. wants to establish conservative credential. beyond that i don't think she got the support, i think, that justice to be kagan can expect with the renegade s in the fine-- state, susan collins and olympia snowee, lamar alexander and lindsey graham. and then for retiring, republican senators kit barnum, dick lugar of indiana and judd gregg of new hampshire. but i think it will be a smaller group than that supporting justice kagan. >> woodruff: i'm moving along to a number of different things here, david, to immigration. the president made the first major speech of his presidency yesterday on immigration reform. but hardly anyone thinks it's going anywhere. >> you have to have a political strategy. you can't just-- he said some

interesting they are saying this is a very conservative court when we just recently had -- the recent sonia sotomayor confirmation into the supreme court as well as elene kagan. this would change things dramatically if she gets put in. host: why do you think that? caller: she seems to me very anti-free speech, anti- constitutional, and very liberal and radical and her views and i find it ironic that we had these two left-leaning, identity politics, political choices, and very liberal that you have this left publication, "the new york times", saying it will be the most conservative the supreme court. i find that ironic. host: elena kagan a subject of another story in "the new york times" about the court. with a vote expected soon, her confirmation to the supreme court is all but assured but it does not mean your presence will be fully felt when the court returns in october. she has identified 11 cases she would step aside in because she worked on them as attorney general. that amounts to more than 1/4 of .he coucases if anything, her hearings highlighted how vague the standards are. we are returning t

one, there was a lot of talk that sown sown -- ddsonson that sonia sotomayor.l throw in the usual disclaimer that the first year, doesn't mean you can predict that. but i don't think we saw that anywhere. but as far as how the court changes without justice steven, it changes a lot. he really was the leader of that side of the justices. and it sort of -- inside baseball to a great extent, but who gets to assign the opinions will change greatly with justice stevens gone. he won't be the senior member there making the decision when the chief justice is not in the majority. i think it changes the dynamic of the conference, which some people have talked about, about the order in which the justices speak and lay out the cases. exactly how it changes depends on the cases they take, but i certainly think it is a big change. >> well, i'll -- because of the convenient scheduling of the confirmation hearings to conflict with the last day of the supreme court term, i missed the first two days, because i was covering what the court decided, so i can't say i know everything

but i i remember -- it was hard for me to vote against sonia sotomayor, but her comments to us have not been lived up to with regard to this issue alone and there may be others, as well. the things we were so worried about turned out to be proper worries. so this s always a difficult thing for us, especially when you have a nice, intelligent person. you want to support. all i can say is this, mr. chairman, i understand there are differing points of view and differing feelings about these matters, but we are talking about one of the most important positions in the world. one of nine in the greatest court in the world. it's something i really take seriously. i'm anguishing over this, without question. mr. chairman, thank you for being kind to me. >> thank you, senator. senator sessions, do you want to ask questions? >> i have one question. >> i read a recent op-ed article in "national review" online concerning general kagan's abortion history or analysis of that. >> without objection. >> miss young, one thing that bothered me was i had indicated in my opening statement that it appeared th