And that we work hard. Rose associate Justice Sonia sotomayor for the hour, next. Captioning sponsored by Rose Communications from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. Rose associate Justice Sonia sotomayor is here. She made history in 2009 when she became the first hispanic and the third woman to sit on the Supreme Court. Her story embodies the american dream. She grew up in a Public Housing project in the south bronx. At age seven she was diagnosed with type one diabetes. Her father a factory worker died the following year. She and her younger brother were raised by a single mom who worked long hours just to make ends meet. But adversity did not stop her from ascending to the top of her profession. She went from High School Valedictorian to princeton graduate to law review editor at yale. She served as a prosecutor and a corporate late gator before she was appointed as a District Court judge. While still in her 30s. And then was appointed to the court of appeals. 11 years later she was sworn in as the nations 111th justice. She tells her personal story in a new memoir. Is it called my beloved world. I am very pleased to have Justice Sonia sotomayor at this table for the first time. Welcome. Great to see you. Thank you, charlie. Im delighted to be here. Rose welcome back to new york. laughs you know, it will always be the home of my heart. As you may know, ive bought an apartment in washington and its my new residence. Rose ive been reading ant how youre getting to know the neighborhood and all that. Oh, yes laughs but theres always a part of new york that kind of lights up my insides and my smile. Rose so youve written this book. Here is what the New York Times said today in a big story about you. Right here on the front page of the New York Times they said you have become the queen of the book tour according to the New York Times. Welcome to another night in the life of sonia sotomayor. Supreme Court Justice current queen of bestseller list and suddenly the nations most high profile hispanic figure. The release of her new memoir my beloved world suggests she has broader ambitions than her colleagues to play a larger more personal role on the public stage. Accurate . No. I think that reporter misunderstood the purpose of why im doing what ive done. The book explains itself. Rose right. It says i have that lived a life with a lot of challenges, a life maybe not identical to everyone, but i think in reading this book everyone will find pa piece of my life that rings accord within them. And my hope was as people read it at the end they would come away saying you know, shes just like me. And if she can do what she did so can i. Maybe not be a supreme Court Justice, but chase that dream whatever they have. And find a place along the journey that will enrich them more and will bring Something Special into their life. Because thats what i think its about, the journey. But what that misperceives a s that i dont have an ambition to be on a more public stage. I have no ambitions of that nature. What i wanted to do was touch people and touch their sense of hope. Rose let me try to defend her for a second. Ah okay. Rose shes a very good reporter. Im sure of that. Rose not that you had something ambition to be something that you werent but you thought your story was part of the public conversations and that from your personal story might mean might give meanings to other peoples lives and therefore you would talk about the life you have lived in the hopes where whether its diabetes, whether its hard work whether its a mother that care deeply about you and your brother who became a doctor there would be in those stories something very human and meaningful. If thats what she meant i agree with her wholeheartedly. Rose how am i doing representinger . Youre doing a wonderful job. She should hire you as hur lawyer. Almost almost unavoidable for know realize that people were very interested in my personal story. Almost every audience i spoke to during my first year on the Supreme Court, half the questions would be about the court and its processes, as to be expected. The other half, however, were about my personal circumstances. And it was very clear from the people asking that they were looking for something. That they identified in some way with my story and wanted to know more about the lessons i had learned in my life. A lot of the questions came from kids but a lot of questions came from adults still seeking. Rose and what are they asking as you go across this country meeting people on your book tour . What is it they ask of you . You know, almost the same questions even after reading the book. Theres this sense that its impossible to do what ive done. And yet the book tells them not only is it possible but i dont have answers that require special talent. Is i talk to kids, theyll ask me whats the greatest obstacles youve met . And my answer to every one of them is two. One is fear because it can paralyze you and you need friends around you when youre that insecure to look at you and say, oh, stop being so ridiculous. Push you from behind to keep going. And the second is peoples arrogance in thinking they cant say i dont know. And those are two things that dont require talent, they dont require some magical quality in each individual, it requires just a recognition of what have can hold you back and the ability to say, yes, im afraid but im going to try anyway. And the ability to say i dont have all the answers and i can ask others for help. Rose did you always believe in yourself . Hmm. I believed that if i worked hard enough at a task i might not be able to master it perfectly but i could become competent. And so i describe in the book not being a very good salsa dancer despite popular rumors. Rose laughs yes. But i figured out because im a little bit i am pitch deaf and i have no sense of innate rhythm. Rose now ive found something you and i share. Oh, i can tell you, im sure we share more. But i found out how i could compensate and that was by watching my partner and taking his lead. And so i found a way around the problem and thats what i mean about i always had enough faith in myself to know that if i kept trying id figure a way either around the problem or master what it is i was trying to do. Rose when you had to take receive daily injections of insulin because you were type one diabetic, your father did it your mother did it and you werent satisfied. You wanted to do it so you learned to do it yourself. Well, all you have to do is receive a shot from two scared parents each of which hurts you, one was worse than the other. My trained nurse mother was so resolute in her intent to give me the shot and i think internally probably so upset that her jab was even harder than my fathers. Rose so you said ill do this. Ive got to do this. I cant be hurting like this forever. And the reality is that there were other reasons that i detail in the book but, yes, youre right there. s a sense that i there was a part of me that has at times been wracked with insecurity but most of the time ive been willing to say let me try. And i think that if i can sort of open that possibility up to people in my book than the book will have meaning to many. In your judgment, have you worked harder than most people you know . Oh, what an interesting question. Hmm. I dont think. So i know lots of people, especially youre a lawyer and a judge you know my colleagues. Virtually every one of them works as hard as i do. That was true on every level of the judiciary ive been in. And regrettably one of the prices of being a lawyer is that you do perhour work which means to make your living youve got to work long hours so, no, but are there people who have chosen to balance their life in other ways and work less hours than i do . Yes, obviously. Rose let me go back to the south bronx. Not only are you very successful your brother is a doctor. He is. Rose describe your mother for me. Oh, the book does that. Rose i know. My absolute favorite chapter in this book is the one chapter 7, the story of her life and of her romance with my father. Its a story that i found in writing this book. I tell every audience dont jump to that chapter first. Read what precedes it because to appreciate chapter 7 you have to know what had happened to me and what i saw as a child to understand the beauty of what i learned in chapter 7. But my mom im my mom. Rose you are your mom . I am my mom. A woman with a lot of strengths, a bit more insecurities than ive had, but a lot of vision about what was important in life. Education being the primary importance and if i heard once i must have heard everyday in my childhood education opens the door of opportunity for you. It took me a while to realize that thats not the only thing it does for you. It also enriches you as a person. But she also taught me what i think the most important thing and thats to be caring about people. Now, my mom didnt understand Public Service in the way that ive participated in it. Sort of didnt lead Community Boards or lead rose she probably didnt have time she didnt. She was raising two kids and working six days a week and trying to survive. But she showed me what it meant to care about people. I detail in the book how my mother was a local nurse to the projects in the coop city where we lived, how giving she was to everyone shes met. And i learned from her example that that was an important value in life to give to others. Rose did you also learn in your experience that you cannot do it alone . Oh, gosh, thats what the whole book is about. Its how i stand on the shoulders of so many people who have helped push me up, who have supported me, opened doors for me, helped me to learn. You know, i talked to people now sometimes on the book tour who say to me ive done it alone. And i look at them and i say think about that statement. You may not have had parents who could have helped you but i suspect you had someone in your life whos given you more meaning in an important way. Whether it was a teacher, a grandmother, a relative, a friend, whether its a spouse. There are always people who come to aid you in your life recognizing it and being grateful is so important. Rose have you had great mentors . Tremendous mentors and each one of them taught me something very important. Rose what do you mean . Every one of them has hired people who they thought were smarter than they. Rose me. I understand you do the same thing. Ive been told that. Rose i do. laughs im told by the president that he does that. To have the confidence not to be challenged by people who are smarter in a negative way, to be afraid of them but to grow yourself from them is a wonderful, wonderful rose also you have to be careful that you dont intimidate people. One who has power has to make sure that the power doesnt intimidate someone so they dont tell you what you need to know to do your job best. I actually have a beginning conversation with my law clerks each year and i sit them down and i tell them i dont hire yes people. You will have failed me if you think im wrong and dont challenge me to think differently. Rose so what are you looking for in the kind of person that you want there that youre going to give a leg up to by the association into the world of a legal life . You look at grades and you look at accomplishments but you also look at writing skill and so i read the writing samples given to me and you see the strength and the weaknesses of their capacitys in writing. Some people just havent quite gotten there yet in their writing experience and you can tell that from the writing samples you give me. But in the end for me im looking for good people. I see that reflected in whether theyre team players. How much have they been able to lead people to do things that arent normally accomplished . Because that tells me that theyre respected and i want to see passion. Rose laughs yes. And i dont care what kind of passion it is. I hired someone who had been a passionate teacher. She changed into law for a variety of different reasons. But as a teacher you could see that her heart was really in it. I have hired people whose backgrounds are just totally different from mine and all they want to be not all, but they want to be successful lawyers in private practice. Thats a passion. Rose yes. I describe some of my friends in here who have that passion in my book. I just want to see that they really have worked hard at accomplishing something important in the activities they undertake and that they can talk to me about something that really excites them. Rose there are people who write with more style and flourish on the court than you do. And you acknowledge that. Uhhuh. Rose do you choose the way you do it out of what would be is your skills or out of what you think is the best way to get across the point. Rose best way to get across the point. I actually believe that you persuade by legal reason. You have to put emotion into your opinions and i certainly do. Rose and human example. And human example. I dont think thats missing from my opinion. If you read my opinions youll see when im upset about something and think that something needs to be expressed about the human condition. But thats not going to convince anybody to say that this is the right answer merely because its right, that isnt going to change anyones mind to show it to them in the law, to make them understand why the law is structured in the way it is. You have to do it with pure legal reasoning. Rose but are those two things mutually exclusive . Cant you have pure legal reasoning and also a brilliant wordsmanship . Yes, you can and learn at hand and other great judges have. Rose Oliver Wendell holmes. I havent quite found that yet. Rose in your own sill . In my own self, how to do that fine balance. But i think ive been a judge for 20 years. I think my works craftsmanship is pretty darn good. And i think its persuasive legal writing. So i havent aspired to much more than that. I let my creativity come out in this book. Rose what did princeton give you . Well, i learned how to write there. Rose yes. And that was because i had two history professors who took an interest enough in me to help me figure it out. Ful i talk about what i did which was to reread grammar books from first grade through high school and vocabulary books i learned five new words a day. An examnal my brother took on when he got to college, he thought vocabulary books took some of the ones that i still had left over and memorized five new words a day. But they also taught me the beauty of learning. I went to princeton with no preset notion of what i would major in and i wanted a wide exposure. I wanted that liberal arts education. I took economics courses, sociology courses, psychology courses, lots of history and Political Science courses. But an art course just to learn about art. I took a philosophy course because i had loved the one philosophy course i had in high school to learn about the philosophy ideas of the rest of the world. And so for me princeton gave me the opportunity to be a real student in the sense of having my world expand in a way i had never anticipated before. Rose when did you decide the go to law school . That i decided when i was very young. Rose serious . Very, very serious. I have notes from Grammar School friends who were with me through those years throughout the entire time and one of them said to me you were talking about being a legal as early as fifth grade. And thats about right. Rose but was it because of television . Oh, as you will learn from the book, it was a combination of two things. The unsophisticated reason for becoming a lawyer was from television. I was diagnosed with diabetes, i love nancy drew but after my diagnosis i learned i couldnt be like her because i couldnt be a detective. And by watching perry mason shortly after that information came to me i figured out that half a show involved investigation of the crime and the other half, his work in the courtroom, to prove the guilty party guilty. The guilty witness guilty. Now thats never happened in real life to me and its never happened in any transcript ive ever seen that a defense lawyer breaks down someone to confess. But it wasnt that that motivated my desire to be a lawyer. It was the investigative part of it. It gave me a way to accomplish the that childhood desire to be nancy drew. The idea, though, stuck and it stuck as i proceeded to sort of start thinking about educating myself in public speaking, in debate, in student government. All of those activities reinforced for me that i might make a good lawyer. But i think in the end what convinced me to be a lawyer the most was understanding that it was law was a way to help people structure their relationships. Rose which is why we need rules and regulations and law. I talk about the importance of lord of the flies in my life. Rose tell us, what was the important of lord of the flies. Showing me what society could break down into without the rules and regulations. Rose exactly. But something else. Which is without an influence in this society that accepted the importance of those values, most of us get it through our families. They teach us how important order is to each us and decency is to us. Thats partly for from morals, partly from religion, its also from the law. And these young ones, these kids didnt have their that influence last long enough to draw them into an ordered society. Rose so what was the primary influence of the private Catholic School you went to. To help me choose to be a good person. Rose your parents taught you that . They didnt tell you, they taught in the a lot by example. And discipline, obviously. I talk a lot about rose im sure they disciplined you. Oh, they did, in not always such nice ways. I describe that in the book. But they talk to you about the choice we had as people. To be good or bad people. And they taught about the consequences of that in the afterlife but it seeped into understanding that to choose to be a good person was, a, a choice and, b, one with importance. And to me thats an eternal gift. As you may know, my Grammar School is being closed by the archdiocese. Rose i do know that. And and i am so incredibly heartbroken because my Grammar School and almost all on that list are all inner city schools where parents are sending their kids because its the only choice they have for a slightly safer environment than the kids may face in the Public Schools that exist in their