As a professor of constitutional law, my natural inclination is to want to see the next President appoint an openly LGBT person to the Supreme Court of the United States.

The appointment of the first Jewish (Louis Brandeis), female (Sandra Day O’Connor) and black (Thurgood Marshall) Justice to the Supreme Court marked an important step in the full acknowledgement of the voices of each of those groups in our system of constitutional law.

It is time now for the appointment of the first openly LGBT Justice.

Although individual Justices do not “represent” their constituents in the way elected officials do, there is no doubt that an openly LGBT Justice would bring a distinctive set of experiences and perspectives to the Court. Moreover, the appointment of such a Justice would publicly recognize the standing of LGBT citizens in our society in a way that in itself help to further the equality of all individuals under the law.

There are many quite sensible nominees based on their achievements in the legal profession. Two obvious candidates would be Kathleen Sullivan, former Dean of the Stanford Law School, and Pamela Karlan, one of the nation’s most distinguished scholars of constitutional law.

Geoffrey R. Stone is the Edward H. Levi Distinguished Service Professor of Law at the University of Chicago

Go back to the main story for more opinions on where we need LGBT officials.