Top 120 Sonia Sotomayor Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “Success is its own reward, but failure is a great teacher too, and not to be feared.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

2. “A surplus of effort could overcome a deficit of confidence.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

3. “Remember that no one succeeds alone. Never walk alone in your future paths.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

4. “Don’t mistake politeness for lack of strength.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

5. “Until we get equality in education, we won’t have an equal society.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

6. “The Latina in me is an ember that blazes forever.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

7. “A role model in the flesh provides more than inspiration; his or her very existence is confirmation of possibilities one may have every reason to doubt, saying, Yes, someone like me can do this.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

8. “In every position that I’ve been in, there have been naysayers who don’t believe I’m qualified or who don’t believe I can do the work. And I feel a special responsibility to prove them wrong.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

9. “Diabetes taught me discipline.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

10. “I have never had to face anything that could overwhelm the native optimism and stubborn perseverance I was blessed with.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

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

— Sonia Sotomayor

12. “I am an ordinary person who has been blessed with extraordinary opportunities and experiences. Today is one of those experiences.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

13. “I’m young at heart. I’m young in spirit, and I’m still adventurous.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

14. “As you discover what strength you can draw from your community in this world from which it stands apart, look outward as well as inward. Build bridges instead of walls.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

15. “The dynamism of any diverse community depends not only on the diversity itself but on promoting a sense of belonging among those who formerly would have been considered and felt themselves outsiders.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

16. “If your child marches to a different beat, a different drummer, you might just have to go along with that music. Help them achieve what’s important to them.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

17. “You can’t dream unless you know what the possibilities are.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

18. “My judicial philosophy is fidelity to the law.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

19. “Experience has taught me that you cannot value dreams according to the odds of their coming true. Their real value is in stirring within us the will to aspire.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

20. “My job as a prosecutor is to do justice. And justice is served when a guilty man is convicted and an innocent man is not.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

21. “An alcoholic father, poverty, my own juvenile diabetes, the limited English my parents spoke – although my mother has become completely bilingual since. All these things intrude on what most people think of as happiness.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

22. “There are no bystanders in this life.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

23. “I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn’t lived that life.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

24. “We educated, privileged lawyers have a professional and moral duty to represent the underrepresented in our society, to ensure that justice exists for all, both legal and economic justice.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

25. “There are uses to adversity, and they don’t reveal themselves until tested. Whether it’s serious illness, financial hardship, or the simple constraint of parents who speak limited English, difficulty can tap unexpected strengths.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

26. “People who live in difficult circumstances need to know that happy endings are possible. Page 1.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

27. “I was a keen observer and listener. I picked up on clues. I figured things out logically, and I enjoyed puzzles. I loved the clear, focused feeling that came when I concentrated on solving a problem and everything else faded out.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

28. “Much of the uncertainty of law is not an unfortunate accident: it is of immense social value.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

29. “The challenges I have faced – among them material poverty, chronic illness, and being raised by a single mother – are not uncommon, but neither have they kept me from uncommon achievements.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

30. “I firmly believe in the rule of law as the foundation for all of our basic rights.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

31. “We apply law to facts. We don’t apply feelings to facts.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

32. “You know, failure hurts. Any kind of failure stings. If you live in the sting, you will – undoubtedly – fail. My way of getting past the sting is to say no, I’m just not going to let this get me down.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

33. “Sometimes, even if there was no useful advice to give, I saw that listening still helped.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

34. “It really takes growing up to treasure the specialness of being different.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

35. “Pretending to be a princess is fun, but it is definitely not a career.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

36. “When I call myself an affirmative action baby, I’m talking about the essence of what affirmative action was when it started.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

37. “Each time I see a split infinitive, an inconsistent tense structure or the unnecessary use of the passive voice, I blister.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

38. “I think being a Catholic made me a better person. It taught me how to choose good over evil, and how to be a more caring human being.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

39. “You make your life choices understanding that you might and do have to work harder to prove yourself.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

40. “It is very important when you judge to recognize that you have to stay impartial. That’s what the nature of my job is. I have to unhook myself from my emotional responses and try to stay within my unemotional, objective persona.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

41. “Reaching a conclusion has to start with what the parties are arguing, but examining in all situations carefully the facts as they prove them or not prove them, the record as they create it, and then making a decision that is limited to what the law says on the facts before the judge.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

42. “You’ve got to get your education! It’s the only way to get ahead in the world.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

43. “Good people can do bad things, make bad decisions. It doesn’t make them bad people.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

44. “If the system is broken, my inclination is to fix it rather than to fight it. I have faith in the process of the law, and if it is carried out fairly, I can live with the results, whatever they may be.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

45. “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

46. “Although wisdom is built on life experiences, the mere accumulation of years guarantees nothing.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

47. “I was fifteen years old when I understood how it is that things break down: people can’t imagine someone else’s point of view.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

48. “I’ve spent my whole life learning how to do things that were hard for me.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

49. “I am a product of affirmative action. I am the perfect affirmative action baby. I am Puerto Rican, born and raised in the south Bronx. My test scores were not comparable to my colleagues at Princeton and Yale. Not so far off so that I wasn’t able to succeed at those institutions.”

— Sonia Sotomayor

50. “The truth is that since childhood I had cultivated an existential independence. It came from perceiving the adults around me as unreliable, and without it I felt I wouldn’t have survived. I cared deeply for everyone in my family, but in the end I depended on myself.”

— Sonia Sotomayor