NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WTVF) — President Joe Biden made good on his campaign promise to nominate the first black women to the nation's highest court.
"My nominee for the United States supreme court is Judge Ketanji Jackson," the president said during a press conference announcing Jackson as his nominee.
It's an announcement president of the NAACP Nashville Chapter Sheryl Guinn is celebratring. Guinn said its time that the supreme court reflects the diversity of this country.
"It was just like finally, you know what I mean finally there is the recognition," Guinn said.
She said Judge Jackson's nomination will help black children dream big because they'll know that sitting on the highest court of the land is within reach.
"I mean you kept us to the point where we couldn't read. I mean it was literally illegal for us to read and now we're sitting on the highest court of the land... and making decisions that you and all of your family have to follow," she said.
Guinn said Judge Jackson's nomination will help black children dream big because they'll know that being a Supreme Court justice is within reach.
"When you see someone that looks like you in places it reminds you that I really can get to those other places. Those really can be goals for me. It's not something that's off limits," she said.
The fact that in the court's 233-year history only one nominee has been a black woman is something Guinn laments.
"I'm very happy, very happy for her accomplishments, but she wasn't the first. And I'm sure she would be the first to say I wasn't the first or the only. I was just the one at the right place at the right time. And I'm very thankful she was at the right place at the right time," Guinn said.
Guinn said today is a victory, but work remains to be done, to not only see Judge Jackson on the bench soon, but others who look like her.
