A Judge Well Chosen

Sandra Day O’Connor’s confirmation hearings for appointment to the Supreme Court were more of a challenge to her stamina than her intellect. She was, if anything, over-prepared for the fumbling, tedious questions of the Senators on the Judiciary Committee, leaving single-issue inquisitors in utter disarray.

Senators East, Grassley and Denton did what they could to make the committee look silly with repeated, clumsy and ultimately futile inquiries into Judge O’Connor’s views on pro- abortion court decisions and anti-abortion legislation. They affected surprise at her courteous but steady refusal to prejudge issues that still clamor for the Court’s attention. They helped her look very good indeed.

Not all of her testimony was reassuring. In her desire to enhance the prestige of state courts, Judge O’Connor was disquietingly cool to arguments that citizens with disputes based on the Constitution and Federal law should have easy access to the Federal courts. She testified with refreshing candor that the 1966 decision on confessions, *Miranda v. Arizona*, which some cite as an example of coddling criminals, had done little harm to law enforcement in her home state.

Yet she simplistically downgraded as “judge-made” the long-standing rule against courtroom use of illegally seized evidence. She also dismissed so-called judicial “activism” too quickly. “I know the difference between judging and legislating,” she said, the difference between “interpreting the law” and “making