Justice Sotomayor questions if Americans know the difference between presidents and kings

Liberal Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor on Tuesday warned that the poor quality of civics education means Americans may not know the difference between a president and a king.

Sotomayor bemoaned the lack of education about such issues as the rule of law, saying not enough people have a basic understanding of the power of the president and the limits imposed upon that authority by the Constitution.

"Do we understand what the difference is between a king and a president?" she said at a civics conference held at New York Law School in Manhattan. "And I think if people understood these things from the beginning, they would be more informed as to what would be important in a democracy."

Sotomayor did not directly address the fractious political moment, with President Donald Trump adopting an aggressive use of unilateral executive power.

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She has been a dissenting voice as the Supreme Court has green-lit many of those actions, including Trump's downsizing of federal agencies and firing of officials whom Congress intended to be protected from political influence.

Sotomayor also dissented when the Supreme Court last year said Trump had broad immunity for his efforts to overturn the 2020 election results at the end of his first term.

"In every use of official power, the President is now a king above the law," Sotomayor wrote in that dissenting opinion, which was released in July 2024.

In stressing the need for children to be educated about government Tuesday, Sotomayor cited a poll that she said found few young people even support democracy.

Without that, "what's left?" she asked.

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This does not mean the American people should always accept that laws on the books should never be changed, Sotomayor said, pointing to slavery and segregation as examples.

"The assumption that all laws are good is not necessarily a starting proposition. We've already experienced, in our country, bad laws," she added.

Without specifying individuals, Sotomayor criticized lawmakers with law degrees who propose laws that would criminalize free speech. The Trump administration has also been cracking down on speech it disfavors, particularly on university campuses.

"Every time I listen to a lawyer-trained representative saying we should criminalize free speech in some way, I think to myself that law school failed," Sotomayor said.