Despite a slim gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender caseload, federal judge Sonia Sotomayor's pro-gay credentials have increased with the release of new documents.

Sotomayor, President Obama's pick to fill the Supreme Court seat being vacated by Justice David Souter, has a scant history of ruling on gay issues. She's heard three cases involving gay men who sought amnesty in the U.S. because they feared persecution if they returned home. Neither of these cases dealt with gay rights per se, focusing on immigration law instead, according to a report by gay weekly Gay City News.

The fourth case dealt with discrimination based on sexual orientation. It involved a straight Roman Catholic priest who alleged sexual abuse at the hands of archdiocese officials in New York. The federal appeals court agreed with a lower court ruling that dismissed the case because federal law does not recognize sexual orientation as a protected class.

But new documents released this week by the White House paint a more gay friendly profile of the Latina judge.

One document introduced to the Senate Judiciary Committee charged with reviewing her nomination is a 1976 letter co-signed by Sotomayor while at Princeton.

“For private citizens to try to intimidate the Gay Alliance into silence is a denial of the foundations on which a university is built,” the letter reads.

The letter, published on February 27, 1976 in the school's daily The Daily Princetonian, is a response by 39 individuals to an attack on two gay students who were members of the Gay Alliance of Princeton. On February 21, the student's dorm room was ransacked to intimidate the pair.

“No matter how much one may disagree with the Gay Alliance or the policies they are advocating, no matter how repugnant one may find homosexuality, the manner of expressing this opposition should be intellectual. At this university we are dedicated to persuasion by reason, not by brute force.”

“We hope that freedom of expression on this campus is still intact. We must keep it that way by supporting all forms of expression, not just those with which we are comfortable,” reads the letter addressed to the university's chairman.

Social conservatives have attacked Sotomayor's nomination, labeling her an “activist” judge, despite evidence to the contrary; her opinions do not overreach and she does not harbor an extreme ideology.

But the letter is certain to provide fodder for social conservatives attempting to pin a judicial activist label on Sotomayor as her nomination moves forward.