9:00 AM BY MAEGAN LA MAMITA MALA – POLITICS| PUERTO RICO| WOMEN
1Jun2009 – VivirLatino.com

According to an article I received in my inbox Sotomayor has said something on Puerto Rico’s status and sovereignty.
NCM Puerto rico

OBAMA’S STRATEGIC MOVES ON PUERTO RICO
Jesús Dávila (Translation by Jan Susler)
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico, May 26, 2009 (NCM) – President Barack Obama named to the Supreme Court a jurist who developed the theory that it is viable to make special arrangements with Puerto Rico if it is annexed as a state of the Union, at the same time that its Government initiated steps to free an independentista political prisoner.

Obama’s two strategic actions on Puerto Rico, taken the same day, refer to events that took place about 30 years ago related to two very different aspects of the colonial case of this Caribbean nation, which the U.S. chief has promised to resolved during his first term in office.
The first took place in 1979 when Sonia Sotomayor, a Puerto Rican born and raised in the Bronx, New York, wrote an essay for the Yale University Law Journal — from which she graduated with honors — in which she argued that the history of Puerto Rico as a colony made it constitutionally viable for the United States to respect Puerto Rico’s rights over mining and petroleum in its territorial waters up to 200 miles. According to Sotomayor, as a colonial power, the U.S. acquired a responsibility over “several poor dependencies” and that “some of them, like Puerto Rico, may seek statehood unless they are accorded a greater measure of self-government,” so that arrangements such as giving them the rights over underwater resources would help the new state of the Union to “overcome its economic problems.”

Sotomayor argued then that nothing in the Constitution would prevent the U.S. from giving that special treatment to Puerto Rico. Over time, that brilliant young attorney, whose juridical history is described as “moderate,” and who is a member of the American Philosophical Society, became a district court judge under the presidency of Democrat William J. Clinton, and became an appellate judge during the mandate of his Republican successor George Bush. Now, after intense lobbying by powerful Puerto Rican congresswoman Nydia Velázquez, with the support of Senator Charles Schumer (both Democrats from New York), Sotomayor has become the first Puerto Rican woman named to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Many people mention famous cases in which she has ruled, such as the decision which resolved the dispute that paralyzed the U.S. professional baseball league, but few recall her expertise in terms of special means to make viable Puerto Rico’s becoming a state of the Union .

The second case occurred only months after Sotomayor wrote her essay, when, in Evanston , Chicago , a dozen members of the Armed Forces of National Liberation of Puerto Rico were arrested — an organization with a history of attacks related to the struggle for the independence of Puerto Rico. Among those arrested, who refused to defend themselves because they took the position of “prisoner of war,” was young Carlos Alberto Torres.

At the same time Obama monopolized the media’s attention by naming Sotomayor, without making much noise, the U.S. Parole Commission convened a hearing with Torres, one of the longest held political prisoners. The commission agreed to recommend a gradual process to release Torres, which would include his transfer to a halfway house for six months, after which he could be released under special conditions.

The nomination of Sotomayor, as well as Torres’ release, related to determinations which will have to be approved by their respective organisms before being finalized. In the particular case of the Supreme Court nominee, the vote will be taken by the Senate in Washington , and sectors of the right wing U.S. press have already begun to attack her.

For the statehood movement, which controls the Puerto Rican government, legislature, Resident Commissioner in Washington , and even the insular Supreme court, Sotomayor’s nomination to the U.S. Supreme court was received with great enthusiasm. The high court would be that last appellate resource if legal controversies are generated over the process to review Puerto Rico’s political condition, a process already begun in Congress, though without the consensus of Puerto Rican political forces.

But Sotomayor’s nomination was not only applauded by annexationists; it immediately received solid support from the autonomists and from various Puerto Rican sectors, in the Island as well as in the Puerto Rican “diaspora” in the U.S. Sotomayor’s father died when she was young, and her mother raised her in a poor neighborhood in the Bronx. She was a superior student with an impressive record of social service — such as her participation in the Puerto Rican Legal Defense Fund. Sotomayor is now a symbol of Puerto Rican pride that goes beyond party lines or doctrines.

The case of the release of the political prisoners, on the other hand, is another topic that has shown itself to be the object of support from broad sectors in Puerto Rico and the U.S. However, these are the first perceptible moves by the new President of the U.S. in a road that seems like a minefield. Evidence of this came last May first when the Boricua Popular Army Macheteros reported they had detected agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation in concert with the Puerto Rico Police, taking positions as sharpshooters on the roofs of nearby buildings as a huge demonstration of workers passed by.

Consistent with its usual policy, the FBI reported that it could not confirm or deny reports that its agents were active the day of the labor demonstration. The Macheteros confirmed that what was seen is indicative that the FBI and the Puerto Rico Police “continue planning operations” like the one of the commando group that killed its commander Filiberto Ojeda in 2005.

The 2005 operation aborted conversations Ojeda was having with the Catholic Church to explore the possibility of a peaceful process for the U.S. to grant independence to Puerto Rico .
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