Former Associate Justice Arthur J. Goldberg criticized, in a news conference yesterday, the concept of a “Jewish seat” on the Supreme Court and affirmed that President Nixon was not under any obligation to designate a Jew as successor to Abe Fortas who resigned from the court last week. “I did not consider when I was appointed to the Supreme Court that I was occupying a Jewish seat,” Mr. Goldberg said. “There is no need in our democracy to appoint a man to any institution of government to preserve a so-called racial balance.”
Mr. Goldberg was appointed to the Supreme Court by the late President Kennedy in 1962 and resigned in 1965 to accept appointment as United Slates Ambassador to the United Nations. On his resignation, President Johnson named Abe Fortas who became the fifth Jew to serve on the nation’s highest tribunal.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
