Newspaper article, The Kauffman-Henry Collection

Senate Confirms Sandra O’Connor Justice Nomination

Newspaper article, The Kauffman-Henry Collection / By

WASHINGTON (AP) – Sandra Day O’Connor, confirmed by a unanimous Senate as the first woman justice on the Supreme Court, promises to be “very busy, very fast” after she is sworn in later this week. There is no clear indication, however, how she will vote on social and constitutional issues that come before the court. The 51-year-old Arizona appeals judge won a 99-0 endorsement in the Senate on Monday as the 102nd justice in the 191-year history of the nation’s highest court. She will be youngest of the nine members. Mrs. O’Connor will be sworn in for her lifetime position in ceremonies Friday afternoon at the Supreme Court building. But because the ceremony will be conducted in the courtroom itself, the recording for posterity will be ‘limited. ” As is the court practice, there will be no TV, no photographs and no tape recordings,” court spokesman Barrett McGurn today said in a printed statement released today. Reporters and artists will be admitted to the ceremony, as they are for all court sessions. There will be no public admission, however, except by invitation. Two “picture opportunities” are scheduled shortly after the 15- minute ceremony. McGurn said official court photographers would be on hand but added, “I know of no plan to have any photograph taken in the courtroom ( during the ceremony).” Chief Justice Warren E. Burger will administer Mrs. O’Connor’s oath of office, and White House officials said President Reagan may attend the Friday ceremony. “My hope is that

Law review article

Sandra Day O’Connor — Woman, Lawyer, Justice: Her First Four Terms on the Supreme Court

Law review article / By

Sandra Day O’Connor – Woman, Lawyer, Justice: Her First Four Terms on the Supreme Court

Barbara C.S. Shea•

INTRODUCTION

Nomination

Four short years ago, few people outside of Arizona had ever heard of San dra Day O’Connor. When President Ronald Reagan nominated her to be the first woman Justice on the Supreme Court in July of 1981, she was catapulted from the relative obscurity of an Arizona Appellate Court judgeship into na tional prominence.1 Almost overnight, her name became a household word.

In offering her nomination to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice Pot ter Stewart,2 Reagan accomplished several political objectives in one swift move. He appeased women’s rights groups who were unhappy with his failure to appoint more women to high-level government positions.8 He disavowed in deed, if not in word, the plank of the Republican National Party in the previ-

*Associated with White & Case, New York City; B.A., 1961, Trinity College; M.A., 1980, Fair field University; J.D., 1985, University of Bridgeport School of Law. The author gratefully ac knowledges the contribution of the UMKC Law Review staff.

Editor’s Note: This Article was written before the recent change in composition on the Su preme Court. On September 19, 1986, the Senate approved the appointment of William Rehnquist as Chief Justice, and of Antonin Scalia as Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court. THE WEEK IN CoNGREss-CoNGRESSIONAL INDEX, at 1 (CCH Sept. 19, 1986). There has been much

Editorial, The Kauffman-Henry Collection

Sandra Day O’Connor: a report card

Editorial, The Kauffman-Henry Collection / By

BOSTON – Two years ago, when Sandra Day O’Connor’ was nominated as the first sister to join The Brethren, Reagan called her a “person for all seasons.” The political commentators, on the other hand, called her “a person for all reasons.” She was a two-fer: a conservative and a woman. Now Justice Sandra Day O’Connor has completed her second term at the court with a remarkable finish: She walked down the middle of the road with one foot on each sidewalk. In the court’s closing week, O’Connor cast the swing votes in the Norris pension case. First she agreed with one quartet of justices that pension plans can’t pay smaller monthly benefits to women than to men. Then she agreed with the other quartet of justices that this decision should not be retroactive, that equality would start from today. As Judith Lichtman of the Women’s Legal Defense Fund reads it, “She gave us half a loaf.” And this is, in many ways, a decent summary of the First Woman’s first two years on the bench. O’Connor has sliced the legal bread on her table in an Intriguing way In most cases, O’Connor voted with conservative Justice William Rehnquist. Indeed their nickname , “the Arizona Twins” could be changed to the Arizona Siamese Twins.” She voted with conservatives on the death-penalty issues and on many civil rights issues. She helped narrow the standard for class-action suits and agreed that a plaintiff had to prove an employer’s “intent” to discriminate. Finally, in the long-awaited abortion case, I she wrote

Law review article

Rethinking Government Neutrality Towards Religion Under the Establishment Clause: The Untapped Potential of Justice O’Connor’s Insight

Law review article / By

ESSAYS

RETHINKING GOVERNMENT NEUTRALITY TOWARDS RELIGION UNDER THE ESTABLISHMENT CLAUSE: THE UNTAPPED POTENTIAL OF JUSTICE O’CONNOR’S INSIGHT

ARNOLD H. LOEWYt

Traditional establishment clause analysis forbids any government actions whose purpose or effect is to advance or inhibit religion. In Lynch v. Donnelly Justice O’Connor recast the “advance or inhibit” test to focus on government “endorsement or disapproval” Professor Loewy emphasizes that this refined test prohibits the government from sending a message of either inferiority or superiority to those who adhere to par ticular religious beliefs. In light of Justice O’Connor’s newly formulated test, Professor Loewy re-evaluates past United States Supreme Court de cisions and current common practices in our society: the Supreme Court’s opening invocation, school prayer, the inclusion of the phrase “under God” in the flag salute, and the convening of student religious groups in public schools. Professor Loewy concludes that government neutrality towards religion, which the establishment clause mandates, can be achieved best by a serious application of the endorsement/disap proval test.

If ever a series of decisions needed rethinking, it is those in which govern ment has arguably breached its obligation of neutrality by sponsoring or de meaning religion.1 Although current establishment clause doctrine forbids any government actions whose purpose or effect is to advance or inhibit religion,2 it

t Professor of Law, The University

Newspaper article, The Kauffman-Henry Collection

Reagan scores hit with women but dismays ‘moral majority’

Newspaper article, The Kauffman-Henry Collection / By

Henry Brandon reports on the row over the first woman member of America’s Supreme Court ‘Controversy over Sandra O’Connor is about abortion’

WHEN Barr y Goldwater , who considers himself one of the most conservative members of the Senate , angrily explained last week : ” I think every good Christian ought to kick Falwell in the ass,” it was quite obvious that something had gone wrong in the kingdom of Republican conservatism. The Arizona senator was excoriating the leader of the extreme right-wing Moral Majority movement, Jerry Falwell because he had condemned President Reagan’s choice of Sandra Day O’Connor to fill a vacancy on the US supreme court . Mrs. O’Connor, a judge on the Arizona court of appeals, will become the first woman to serve on the court . Presidents like to make history and Reagan used this opportunity skilfully. He not only reassured the women’s movements that he is not the male chauvinist they think he is, but he also softened his image as a right-wing conservative by selecting a conservative with an open mind – as a friend of Mrs O’Connor described her-and not a doctrinaire ideologue.

It will not necessarily garner him a windfall of vote s among women , but as representative Morris Udall the liberal Democrat from Arizona , put ‘it : ” The fact that he appointed someone as moderate and as close to the centre of the Republican Party as she is, is really stunning. It erases stereotype opposition to Reagan .” It also created an unexpected opportunity for the

Newspaper article, The Kauffman-Henry Collection

Reagan expected soon to select High court name

Newspaper article, The Kauffman-Henry Collection / By

WASHINGTON (AP) – President Reagan is expected soon to announce his nominee to fill the first vacancy on the nine-member Supreme Court since 1975. The retirement of Associate Justice Potter Stewart was effective at the end of today and there are hints his successor could be named within a few days. Among those on a narrow list of candidates is Sandra D. O’Connor, an Arizona appeals court judge. She would be the first woman to serve on the court. Bill Jacquin, president of the Arizon Chamber of Commerce, said she was interviewed at the White House on Wednesday. The New York Times reported Saturday that Mrs. O’Connor is among “fewer than five” people in contention for the job. The Washington Star said others on the so-called short list include former Solicitor General Robert H. Bork, Judge J . Clifford Wallace of the 9th U.S. Circuit Cort of Appeals and Utah Supreme Court Justice Dallin Oaks. Here, at a glance, is the lineup of Supreme Court justices, listed according to the president who nominated them; giving dates of their birth, of Senate action on their nomination, and when they took office. Retiring Judge Potter Stewart: Born Jan . 23, 1915,i n Jackson, Mich., he was appointed during a Senate recess Oct. 14, 1958, taking office that day. He was then nominated by Presi• dent Eisenhower Jan. 17, 1959; confirmed by the Senate May 5, 1959; and again took the oath of office May 15, 1959. Stewart retired effective Friday in letter to Reagan dated May 18. Reagan accepted Stewart’s

Law review article

Reading’ Justice Sandra Day O’Connor

Law review article / By

“READING” JUSTICE SANDRA DAY O’CONNOR

Carl R. Schenker, Jr.•

On September 25, 1981, Judge Sandra Day O’Connor of the Court of Appeals of Arizona took the oath of office as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. Justice O’Connor’s elevation to the Court should be of great interest to state and local governments because her extensive prior involvement in local government should give her an unusual perspective in cases before the Court implicating state or local interests.

I. INTRODUCTION

Justice O’Connor has served previously as an assistant state attorney general, a state legislator, and a state trial and intermediate appellate court judge. Thus, her professional experiences have been intensely “local” and presumably have versed her thoroughly in many of the problems con fronting state and local governments. By contrast, most of the sitting Jus tices were working within a “federal” context at the time of appointment to the Court. When nominated, Chief Justice Burger and Justices Marshall, Blackmun, and Stevens were all sitting on United States Courts of Ap peals; Justices White and Rehnquist were serving as senior officials in the Department of Justice. And neither of the other members of the Court, Justices Brennan and Powell, had as wide a variety of experiences in state and local government as Justice O’Connor.

Popular publicity concerning Justice O’Connor has emphasized that she is the first woman to sit on the Court, rather than that her experience

Magazine article

Queen of the Center

Magazine article / By

The Swing Vote: She’s a cowgirl from sagebrush country, a pioneer who defied the odds. The life and legacy of a moderate justice.

FOR AN OLD RANCHING GIRL, YOU turned out pretty good,” President George W. Bush told Sandra Day O’Connor when she spoke to the White House last week to say that she was retiring from the Supreme Court. The image of O’Connor as cowgirl is a powerful one, and she has done as much as anyone to foster it. In her chambers, decorated with Western rugs and paintings and artifacts, she served her clerks homemade TexMex lunches on Saturdays. With her fixed and level gaze, her dry, flat voice cutting like the prairie wind, she came across to nervous Supreme Court petitioners like an Annie Oakley of the Bench, a fast draw with sharp questions and a don’t-mess-with-me manner. Her most memorable writing was not the language of her judicial opinions but her memoir of growing up on a ranch, the Lazy B. In her retirement, she will work on a children’s book about her childhood horse, Chico.

But the image can be misleading. Her real legacy on the Supreme Court is not as a self-reliant throwback to the Old West. Rather, as a justice, she embodied an equally endangered species: the moderate establishment progressive, a centrist in an age of ever-edgier extremes. She has become more High Society than High Noon, more country club than cowgirl. She was profoundly out of place in the modern Washington of “Crossfire,” of ideological posturing and filibusters, of the war

Op ed, The Kauffman-Henry Collection

President Reagan is still the ‘Lucky Lindy’ of U.S. politics with his wise choice for the court

Op ed, The Kauffman-Henry Collection / By

. Reagan is still the “Lucky Lindy” of our politics. What could be nicer for a president than to nominate to the Supreme Court a woman backed by Barry Goldwater and attacked by the nuttier elements of the right wing? Reagan gets the best of several worlds. The National Organization for Women praises a former Republican majority leader of the conservative Arizona Legislature. The far, far right makes far right-wingers like Paul Laxalt look “responsible” in their support of Ms. O’Connor. President Reagan, the opponent of feminism, scores a feminist first. Both liberals and conservatives look silly if they oppose this nomination. And, to top it off, Ms. O’Connor is very well qualified. It is almost too good to be true. Some intellectual ideologues in the Reagan camp are disappointed that he did not nominate Robert Bork for the court; but they will probably get their way later, and with less opposition because of this first move. Bork is the principal rival to Justice Rehnquist himself as a right-wing legal scholar . But his appointment will renew embarrassing memories of Watergate. Bork was President Nixon’s solicitor general, and the one man in the Justice Department who stayed around to follow Alexander Haig’s order to fire Archibald Cox as special prosecutor. Some liberals who contributed to the establishment of an Alexander Bickel chair at Yale Law School were upset when Bork became the first to hold it – though Bickel’s views, toward the end of his life, were moving in Bork’s

Interview, Magazine article

Out to Lunch With Sandra Day O’Connor

Interview, Magazine article / By

The first woman on the Supreme Court talks theatrics, guns, and prairie oysters.

BY JOHN HEILPERN ILLUSTRATION BY TIM SHEAFFER

Sandra Day O’Connor met me for lunch at her chambers within that white marble temple to justice, the Supreme Court Building, in Washington, D.C. I was unprepared for the informality and glamour of this mythic American woman. “Sandra,” she said, introducing herself warmly, adding the “Day O’Connor” almost, it seemed, as an afterthought. “So, come sit.”

Her delightful new book, Out of Order: Stories from the History of the Supreme Court (published this month by Random House), gives the forbidding Court a human face, and Justice O’Connor, I would soon learn, could give it nothing less.

The FWOTSC, as she amusingly describes herself—First Woman On The Supreme Court—was born in El Paso, Texas, in 1930, and raised as a cowgirl on the family’s Lazy B Ranch, in the high-desert country south of the Gila River, on the border of Arizona and New Mexico. Since her retirement from the Court, in 2006, she’s lived in Phoenix, but she still uses her office whenever she’s in town. “They haven’t kicked you out?” I asked.

“Not yet, anyway,” she replied.

I mentioned that one can’t help but feel awed by the iconic grandeur of the Supreme Court Building. “I agree. I do, too,” she said.

“Except it unnerves me a bit—as if I’ve got something to prove.”

“Well, you don’t,” she responded with characteristic directness. “So we’ll get over that!”

She became a feminist icon