Obama’s high court list led by women

President Barack Obama’s first U.S. Supreme Court appointment probably will be drawn from a group of women who have achieved prominence in the law or politics, ensuring more diversity and possibly more real-world experience for the high court.

The replacement for retiring Justice David Souter is likely to add a strong liberal voice as a counterweight to the conservative wing, while unlikely to alter the court’s philosophical balance.

“I think it’s a mortal lock” that it will be a woman, said Tom Goldstein, a Supreme Court lawyer with Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld in Washington. “It’s too hard for the president to explain why, given all the highly qualified women who could be Supreme Court justices, he didn’t pick one.”

Ruth Bader Ginsburg is the only woman among the nine justices. For 12 years, she served alongside the first woman on the court, Sandra Day O’Connor, who retired in 2005.

Obama has expressed a desire to bring about more diversity to the court, in experience and background as much as race or gender. One of the leading candidates, Gov. Jennifer Granholm of Michigan, has made her mark in politics.

The justices are split ideologically, with Anthony Kennedy often the deciding vote, on such matters as abortion rights, racial preferences in the workplace and separation of church and state. Souter usually lined up with the liberals.

Obama has said he will choose someone with “a sharp and independent mind and a record of excellence and integrity.” He said he wants someone with an appreciation for “how our laws affect the daily realities of people’s lives.”

The announcement could come as early as this week. The Democratic president said he wants a successor for Souter, 69, to be in place when the court reconvenes in October.