If I write a book where all I've ever experienced is success, people won't take a positive lesson from it. In being candid, I have to own up to my own failures, both in my marriage and in my work environment.

— Sonia Sotomayor

If you held to principle so passionately, so inflexibly, indifferent in the particulars of circumstance - the full range of what human beings, with all their flaws and foibles, might endure or create - if you enthroned principle above even reason, weren't you then abdicating the responsibilities of a thinking person?

— Sonia Sotomayor

I had no need to apologize that the look-wider, search-more affirmative action that Princeton and Yale practiced had opened doors for me. That was its purpose: to create the conditions whereby students from disadvantaged backgrounds could be brought to the starting line of a race many were unaware was even being run.

— Sonia Sotomayor

I have come to believe that in order to thrive, a child must have at least one adult in her life who shows her unconditional love, respect, and confidence.

— Sonia Sotomayor

I have had positive experiences with cameras. When I have been asked to join experiments using cameras in the courtroom, I have participated; I have volunteered.

— Sonia Sotomayor

I have never, ever focused on the negative of things. I always look at the positive.

— Sonia Sotomayor

I hope that as the Senate and American people learn more about me, they will see that I am an ordinary person who has been blessed with extraordinary opportunities and experiences.

— Sonia Sotomayor

In my experience when a friend unloaded about a boyfriend or spouse, the listener soaked up the complaint and remembered it long after the speaker had forgiven the offense.

— Sonia Sotomayor

I strive never to forget the real world consequences of my decisions on individuals, businesses and government.

— Sonia Sotomayor

I think that even someone who got into an institution through affirmative action could prove they were qualified by what they accomplished there. Page 188

— Sonia Sotomayor