Clarence Thomas Supreme Court Nomination
On July 1, 1991, President George H. W. Bush nominated Clarence Thomas for the Supreme Court of the United States to replace Thurgood Marshall, who had announced his retirement. The nomination proceedings were contentious from the start, especially over the issue of abortion, and many women's groups and civil rights groups opposed Thomas on the basis of his conservative political views, as they had also opposed Bush's Supreme Court nominee from the previous year, David Souter.
Toward the end of the confirmation hearings, allegations by Anita Hill, a law professor who had previously worked under Thomas at the United States Department of Education and then at the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), were leaked to the media from a confidential FBI report. The allegations led to a media frenzy and further investigations. Televised hearings were re-opened and held by the Senate Judiciary Committee before the nomination was moved to the full Senate for a vote. Thomas was confirmed by a narrow majority.
Read more about Clarence Thomas Supreme Court Nomination: Nomination, Early Hearings, Allegations About Sexual Comments, Senate Confirmation, Cultural Impact
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“I’m not an Uncle Tom.... I’m going to be here for 40 years. For those who don’t like it, get over it.”
—Clarence Thomas (b. 1948)
“Just a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down.”
—Richard Sherman, songwriter, Robert Sherman, songwriter, and Clarence Brown. A Spoonful of Sugar (song)
“He holds the wire from this box of nerves
Praising the moral error
Of birth and death, the two sad knaves of thieves,
And the hunger’s emperor;
He pulls the chain, the cistern moves.”
—Dylan Thomas (1914–1953)
“The Constitution and the laws are supreme and the Union indissoluble.”
—Andrew Jackson (1767–1845)
“As to “Don Juan,” confess ... that it is the sublime of that there sort of writing; it may be bawdy, but is it not good English? It may be profligate, but is it not life, is it not the thing? Could any man have written it who has not lived in the world? and tooled in a post-chaise? in a hackney coach? in a Gondola? against a wall? in a court carriage? in a vis a vis? on a table? and under it?”
—George Gordon Noel Byron (1788–1824)
“I shall not seek and I will not accept, the nomination of my party for another term as your President.”
—Lyndon Baines Johnson (1908–1973)