O’Connor moves easily toward confirmation

WASHINGTON – Judge Sandra Day O’Connor yesterday moved easily toward confirmation as an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, emphasizing before a generally appreciative Senate Judiciary Committee her belief that “the proper role of the judiciary is one of interpreting and applying the law, not making it.” The first of three scheduled days of confirmation hearings contained few surprises. The members of the committee asked the Arizona Court of Appeals judge questions she seemed to have expected, and she provided answers the senators seemed pleased to hear. Members of the committee, including its chairman, Republican Sen. Strom Thurmond of South Carolina, indicated that confirmation was a virtual certainty. But if the hearing lacked doubt as to outcome, it did not lack drama or a sense that history was being made by the imminent confirmation of the first woman Supreme Court justice in the court’s 191-year history. “Better 190 years late than never,” Republican Sen. Robert Dole of Kansas told the nominee, adding: “You are among friends.” “As the first woman to be nominated as a Supreme Court justice, I am particularly honored,” O’Connor told the committee in her opening statement. “But I happily share the honor with millions of, American women of yesterday and today whose abilities and conduct have given me this opportunity for service.” O’Connor’s opening statement, which followed an hour of comments by members of the committee, set the tone for much of what followed. She