My father kept his distance from working-class American blacks.

A Negro who does not vote is ungrateful to those who have already died in the fight for freedom. ... Any person who does not vote is failing to serve the cause of freedom - his own freedom, his people's freedom, and his country's freedom.

I was born and raised in the oldest settled part of the nation and in an environment in which racism was officially mooted.

Columbia Law School men were being drafted, and suddenly women who had done well in college were considered acceptable candidates for the vacant seats.

Something which we think is impossible now is not impossible in another decade.

In my view, I did not get to the federal bench because I was a woman

The fact is that racism, despite all the doomsayers, has diminished