With 108 of 115 Supreme Court justices white men, Biden’s Black woman justice pick is about time

Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., the Senate Judiciary Committee chair, will steer President Joe Biden’s Supreme Court pick through the confirmation hearing. | Drew Angerer/Getty Images

WASHINGTON — Since the Supreme Court was created in 1789, there have been 115 justices.

All have been white men except for Black justices Thurgood Marshall and Clarence Thomas and the women on the high court, Sandra Day O’Connor; Ruth Bader Ginsburg; Elena Kagan; and Amy Coney Barrett, who are white, and Sonia Sotomayor, the only Hispanic justice in the history of this nation.