In her speech at the White House on Friday, Ketanji Brown Jackson noted the long road it took to have a Black woman appointed to the US Supreme Court.

"It has taken 232 years and 115 prior appointments for a Black woman to be selected to serve on the Supreme Court of the United States," she said amid applause and cheers. "But we've made it. We've made it. All of us. All of us."

"Our children are telling me that they see now more than ever that here in America, anything is possible," she said.

She acknowledged that she has been "flooded with thousands of notes" from people, but the ones from children are "especially meaningful."

"Because more than anything, they speak directly to the hope and promise of America," she said.

The justice-to-be paid tribute to her role models as she recognized that children now see her as one.

Children "also tell me that I am a role model, which I take both as an opportunity and as a huge responsibility," she said. "I am feeling up to the task, primarily because I know that I am not alone. I am standing on the shoulders of my own role models — generations of Americans who never had anything close to this kind of opportunity, but who got up every day and went to work believing in the promise of America."