In a moment when lawlessness has taken center stage globally, today’s announcement of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson as President Biden’s nominee to the United States Supreme Court is an important — and, indeed, joyous — reminder of the need to elevate jurists unflinchingly committed to upholding the rule of law. President Biden has taken our nation a giant step closer to realizing the vision of equal justice under the law in putting forward a nominee in Judge Jackson who is both eminently qualified and the first Black woman nominated to the nation’s highest court.

Black women have always embraced both the ideal and the hard work of seeking justice through the courts– even when the Constitution defined us as less than fully human. From 1781 onward, when an enslaved Black woman sought her freedom through the courts, to the late 19th century, when the first Black woman won admission to the bar, to the courageous legal champions who fashioned legal strategies to dismantle segregation. Black women lawyers have been on the frontlines of many of the nation’s most important legal developments — from the fight to desegregate schools, to developing the legal theories that paved the way for women’s equality in the law, and more. Too many Black women have been overlooked or denied consideration for the highest federal courts and it is on this legacy that Judge Jackson’s nomination stands today.

As President Biden’s nominee to serve as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, Judge Jackson’s stellar record as a public defender and jurist is compelling and evidence of a brilliant legal mind. She is fully deserving of this honor. It is a nomination that is long overdue.

The National Partnership urges the Senate to swiftly confirm this eminently qualified nominee through a fair, transparent, and respectful process.