It will come as no surprise to many readers that people of color are significantly underrepresented on state appellate courts. In fact, while people of color make up roughly one-third of the nation’s population, 25 states currently have all-white Supreme Court benches. The processes by which judges and justices are selected for the bench correlate with more or less diversity on the courts: Merit selection corresponds with the greatest racial diversity on state courts.
If we look to the nation’s law schools, however, we see that enrollment accurately reflects the diversity of our population, with the enrollment of nonwhite students rising from 25.5 percent to 30 percent from 2011 to 2013 despite an overall decrease in students enrolling during that period. Nonetheless, this ever-increasing pool of judicial candidates of color has not yet translated into an increase in judges and justices of color on the appellate benches.
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