Arizona Republic, Op ed, The Kauffman-Henry Collection

O’Connor Facing Two of the Country’s Hardest Roles: Supreme Court Justice and First Woman

Arizona Republic, Op ed, The Kauffman-Henry Collection / By

Last Friday , Sandra O’Connor j(,>ined The Brethren. And an elite sisterhood. Last Friday, Sandra O’Connor became the 102nd Supreme Court Justice. And the first woman Justice. As. all the speeehes about barrierbreaking, history-makiRg, inner-circle-integrating enu, she is settling down to two of the hardest roles in the country: Supreme Court Justice and First Woman. In some ways, this woman who won her robe with the unanimous consent of the Senate and the goodwill of the people, with the approval of conservatives and the best wishes of the women’s rights activists, faces the issues shared by any woman who has ever been the first, the exception, the only, the other. How do you deal with the extra burdens? How do you live with the attention and the expectations? With the demands of conscience and history? Fine service O’Connor wants to be remembered as a good justice, but she will be judged, in large part, as a Woman Justice. Her opinions will be scrutinized for signs of her sex; her behavior will be analyzed for clues of her kind. Like every other first woman, she will be visible and vulnerable, the one justice in the photograph whom everyone can name. She will be criticized if she doesn’t “think like a male justice” and criticized if she does. Someone will surely want her to prove that a woman on the bench makes a difference, and someone else will want her to prove that women on the bench are no different. It is, as Margaret Hennig, dean of the Graduate School of Business Management

Mesa Tribune, Newspaper article, The Kauffman-Henry Collection

O’Connor faces hard foes at confirmation hearing

Mesa Tribune, Newspaper article, The Kauffman-Henry Collection / By

W ASlilNGTON – Although air proval of her nomination to the Supreme Court is all but certain, Sandra O’Connor faces possible hostile questioning on her views on abortion and equal rights at her confirmation hearing today. In addition to President Reagan – who chose the 51-year-old Arizona judge as his first nominee to the high court – Mrs. O’Connor has powerful bipartisan support from her two homestate senators, Republican Barry Goldwater and Democrat Dennis DeConcini. They are expected to help smooth the way to Senate confirmation of Mr.s O’Connor, the first woman ever to be named to the Supreme Court. But conservative groups have made it clear they will not acquiesce in her nomination without a fight. Mrs. O’Connor’s chances received a boost when the American Bar Association rated her “qualified” to serve on the high court. She meets the “highest standards of judicial temperment [sic] and integrity,” the ABA’s judicial reviewing panel said in a letter to Judiciary Committee chairman Strom Thurmond, R-.S.C.

But, the panel added, “Her professional experience to date has not been as extensive or challenging as that of some other persons who might be available for appointment to the Supreme Court of the United States.”

The ABA committee gave Mrs. O’Connor its second highest rating — “qualified,” it said,” after considering her outstanding academic record, her demonstrated intelligence and her service as a legislator, a lawyer and a trial and appellate judge.”

Brooksley Landau,

Newspaper article, The Kauffman-Henry Collection, Wall Street Journal

O’Connor expresses some doubt on rule that bans illegally obtained evidence

Newspaper article, The Kauffman-Henry Collection, Wall Street Journal / By

WASIBNGTON -Opponents of the rule that prevents the use of illegally obtained evidence in criminal trials may have an ally in Supreme Court nominee Sandta O’Connor. Mrs. O’Connor, in the second day of hearings on her nomination, told the Senate Judiciary Committee that she has doubts about thl:! so-called exclusionary rule and also that she is personally in favor of the death penalty and opposed to court-ordered school busing. The exclusionary rule has been under fire from some quarters, including Chief Justice Warren Burger, Justice William Rehnquist and the Attorney General’s Task Force on Violent Crime. Critics charge that application of the rule sometimes requires valuable evidence to be disregarded because of procedural technicalities. Defenders of the rule say it is essential to protect the rights of accused persons. Drawing on her experience as a trial judge for four years, Mrs. O’Connor said she had seen little problem with the requirement that police officers inform persons of their rights when they are arrested. I But, she said, “the exclusionary rule … has proven to be much more difficult in [ terms of the administration of justice. There are times when perfectly relevant evidence, and indeed sometimes the only evidence in I the case,” is excluded when it might be usable “if different standards were applied.” “I don’t want to be interpreted as suggesting that I think it ( the rule) is inappropriate when force or trickery or some other reprehensible conduct has

Newspaper mention, Scottsdale Daily Progress, The Kauffman-Henry Collection

O’Connor dives into new job

Newspaper mention, Scottsdale Daily Progress, The Kauffman-Henry Collection / By

WASHINGTON (AP) – It was a dramatic moment in American history the first time a woman has served on the bench of the U.S. Supreme Court – but Sandra Day O’Connor handled it with the same aplomb she exhibited during her Senate confirmation hearings. As the court began its new term Monday, the 51-year-old former Arizona appeals court judge showed no reluctance in making her public debut as a working Supreme Court justice. Her first inquiry from the bench – regarding a complex offshore oil and natural gas leasing case – came little more than a half hour into the first oral argument. “Mr. Silard, may I ask a question ?” Justice O’Connor said at 10: 46 a.m, John Silard, arguing on behalf of the Energy Action Educational Foundation, already had asked several other justices to delay their questions until he finished a point. He did the same with the court’s 102nd justice, saying: “Just a minute, your honor.” After answering a previous question from the bench, Silard invited O’Connor to proceed. “It isn’t clear, is it, that even if California wins here, that the secretary (of the Interior) would use the bidding system California prefers,” she asked. “The secretary would still be free to use other experiments.” Her question referred to California’s bid in the case to obtain an offshore oil and natural gas leasing system that would yield greater revenue for the state. The views of the educational foundation Silard represents are essentially the same as those held by the state of California.

Daily Territorial Tucson, Newspaper article, The Kauffman-Henry Collection

O’Connor dissents

Daily Territorial Tucson, Newspaper article, The Kauffman-Henry Collection / By

WASHINGTON (UPI) -Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, whose nomination to the nation’s highest court was opposed by anti-abortion groups, Wednesday left no doubt that she adamantly opposes abortion. Dissenting from the high court’s rulings in three cases, Mrs. O’Connor, 53, squarely backed state limits on abortions and used her chance to write against the majority view as a platform to criticize the landmark 1973 Supreme Court ruling legalizing abortion. Mrs. O’Connor, the first woman on the high court, disagreed with most of her colleagues who declared an array of state restrictions on obtaining abortions are unconstitutional. Writing the dissent in a case from Akron, Ohio, she said the legislature is the “appropriate forum” for deciding such’ ‘extremely sensitive issues” as abortion. Such regulations as requiring abortions after the first three months be performed in a hospital are not “undue burdens” on a woman’s rights , she said. The majority, however, disagreed. Nominated to the court by President Reagan, Mrs. O’Connor provided one of only three votes the administration gained in its campaign to persmtde the justices that legistatures should make the final decisions on such politically controversial questions.

Arizona Daily Star, Editorial, The Kauffman-Henry Collection

O’Connor disqualifications puzzling

Arizona Daily Star, Editorial, The Kauffman-Henry Collection / By

WASHING TON -As a Supreme Court justice , Sandra D. O’Connor was expected to draw special attention. She is doing so for an unusual reason: for the things she is not doing. She is declining to participate in court cases at a higher rate than any other justice. Her pattern of frequent self-disqualification appears to be well set after less than six weeks on the bench . So far, the court has held full-scale hearings on 38 cases, and O’Connor stayed off the bench for five of them. That rate of so-called “refusal” is especially high. She also has refused to participate in 18 other cases the court has handled. Following the custom that nearly every justice has adopted, she has refused to explain the disqualifications. The court announces the fact that a justice is out of a case, but usually nothing else is said about it, on or off the record. As in O’Connor’s recent actions, there has been no hint that any disqualifications involved anything illegal or improper. The issue arose fresh for O’Connor last week after her lawyer husband, John J . O’Connor III, signed on as a partner with a Washington law firm. His search for a partnership here apparently involved efforts to avoid an affiliation that would complicate his wife’s judicial life. A member of the firm of Miller & Chevalier said there had been some discussion about how few cases the firm handles in the Supreme Court. It would be automatic for the justice to stay out of any appeal involving her husband ‘s firm . All federal judges

Newspaper article, The Kauffman-Henry Collection, The Washington Post

O’Connor dislikes busing, in favor of death penalty

Newspaper article, The Kauffman-Henry Collection, The Washington Post / By

Supreme Court nominee Sandra D. O’Connor, testifying at her second day of confirmation hearings, said yesterday she was personally opposed to busing and in favor of the death penalty. She also expressed doubts, based on her own experiences as a trial judge, about the hotly debated exclusionary rule, which judges use to throw out evidence illegally seized by police. The Supreme Court is expected to confront all three controversial issues during O’Connor’s life term. They are also traditional targets of Reagan conservatives, and her statements yesterday seemed certain to reinforce her own conservative credentials. These have been questioned by leaders of the New Right, though she stressed that her personal views would play no role in the resolution of cases before the court. The first woman nominee thus concluded her testimony without mishap. In fact, though her lack of federal court experience has been criticized, many senators seemed dazzled by her command of federal law as case citations and statistics rolled easily off her tongue. At one point, she even corrected one committee member’s description of a recent Supreme Court ruling. Several Senate Judiciary Committee members did criticize her unwillingness to express opinions on specific cases, especially abortion rulings, and one, Sen. John P. East (R-N.C.), suggested that she was selectively avoiding comment in order to avoid controversy. Her handling of that criticism typified her performance. Sen. Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa),

Newspaper article, Phoenix Gazette, The Kauffman-Henry Collection

O’Connor Critics Off-Base on Record

Newspaper article, Phoenix Gazette, The Kauffman-Henry Collection / By

President Reagan’s history-making Supreme Court nomination is not likely to dramatically tilt the nation’s highest bench in one political direction, Arizona Appeals Court Judge Sandra O’Connor’s staunch admirers in the feminist community could end up a little disappointed, while her virulent critics – mostly right-to-life and anti-ERA activists – could find her to be something less than the ogre they’re now portraying. THAT’S the conclusion based on a careful review of Mrs. O’Connor’s five-year tenure in the Arizona Senate, the most likely lode of clues to her political leanings, which she has so far politely declined to discuss with newsmen. What Senate records – busily being examined by reporters from across the country this week – reveal is a moderate-to-conservative lawmaker with a fairly regular Republican voting record, and special concerns for improving the law enforcement system and services to the disadvantaged. They do not show a woman carrying a banner on standard women’s issues, such as the Equal Rights Amendment, abortion and family planning. “I’VE NEVER heard her express a strong opinion one way or the other Analysis on those things,” said fellow Appeals Court jurist Lawrence Wren. “I don’t think she can be stereotyped on those issues at all.” In fact, critics blasting her “consistent” pro-abortion voting record will find little in official records to document the claim. In her five years in the Senate, abortion-related bills only reached the Senate floor twice.