• "As eyes across America focus on New Haven and await a potentially landmark Supreme Court decision today on" Ricci v. DeStefano, "the firefighters' promotion case, it's all old news in the city firehouses," the New Haven (Conn.) Register reports.

• "A reversal by the Supreme Court that includes very critical remarks about the lower court ruling could be used as ammunition by some senators who don't want to see" Sonia Sotomayor confirmed, Fox News reports.

• AP reports on Justice David Souter's last day on the Supreme Court.

• Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said Sunday "the Senate Judiciary Committee needs to examine the materials from the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund, now known as LatinoJustice PRLDEF," AP reports.

• "Senate Republicans can be expected to criticize the Sotomayor nomination throughout the recess," Roll Call (subscription) reports. "In particular, Members will speak out against her opinions on gun rights, affirmative action programs and the use of foreign and international laws in the United States, while making the case that her written statements, rulings and speeches 'show an out of the mainstream view of the role of a judge,' according to recess documents."

• The National Law Journal interviews Sen. Ted Kaufman, D-Del., about Sotomayor's nomination. Kaufman was a longtime aide to Senate predecessor Joe Biden when Biden was Senate Judiciary Committee chairman.

• "From the outset, Republicans said they are interested in a fair, thorough and dignified confirmation process. But their minority role requires a rigorous probe of the speeches and judicial opinions of a nominee who could become the nation's first Hispanic woman justice." CQ reported over the weekend.

Commentary

• "Whatever decision the Supreme Court renders in" the Ricci case, "it's clear that it will play an important role in confirmation hearings." In the Washington Examiner, Roger Clegg, president and general counsel of the Center for Equal Opportunity, maintains that "Sotomayor will have to find good answers as to why she allows her beliefs to narrow her reading of the law."

• In an interview with NPR, Slate senior editor Dahlia Lithwick discusses the cases to be handed down this morning, including Ricci.

• On RealClearPolitics.com, Senate Judiciary Committee member Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, expresses his discontent with the timetable Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., has set up for Sotomayor's hearings. "The Senate is forced to examine the largest judicial record in a century for a Supreme Court nominee in the shortest time in modern memory."

• "If Sotomayor is confirmed, we don't want to wait another generation for a third woman justice," Rob Richie and Cynthia Terrell of FairVote, assert in Roll Call (subscription). "Many women are well-prepared to serve on the court and in other high offices."