Unknown Speaker
civic education is kind of going on the back burner. I have to get into a 13 year olds mine is have to make it kid friendly.
Unknown Speaker
One of the greatest challenges is getting the kids to connect
Unknown Speaker
to the past the present and the future. A lot of kids get turned off with history. They always tell me every year is all about dead people because old people in kind of voiceprint
Unknown Speaker
Social Studies is a good subject because you get to learn about your past in the future. Maybe that stuff can be used for something good. Like the amendment. They made them so long ago, and now they're still using them because they work three
Unknown Speaker
of the Constitution was made as a whole different country because it listed many of our rights. we overlook it on everyday basis.
Pat Morrison
I'm Pat Morrison in the Crawford family forum.
And those were the voices of students at Cesar Chavez middle school and Linwood North View High School in Covina, their teachers as well as we are here at a very special event. with former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor talking about civic education. How often in the movies or on the news, you hear someone say, I'm going to take that all the way to the Supreme Court. And yet of the three branches of government, people have some misunderstandings about all of them. And maybe the court in particular, the least understood or the most missed, understood. And because an informed citizenry is the basis of democracy, that can be a problem. So we're delighted to welcome Justice O'Connor, who served at the top of the judicial ladder, and is here to talk about some educational programs to help us understand better how government functions to help us all become better citizens. Justice O'Connor, thank you for being here.
Sandra Day O'Connor
Well, my pleasure, and I hope we can have a good conversation today. I look forward to
Pat Morrison
the the justice of course was the first woman ever to serve on the Supreme Court of Canada hundred
Sandra Day O'Connor
91 year 191 year old
Pat Morrison
And of course since then three other women have been appointed to the court. And but you were alone for 12 years before Justice Ginsburg
Sandra Day O'Connor
joined I was and I go now to Washington pretty often and I still keep an office at the Supreme Court and I still sit on cases on federal courts of appeals throughout the country. So I'm still sitting but not on the Supreme Court. And to sit there today and look up at the bench and see three women on it is incredible to me. I just can't get over it. It looks great.
Pat Morrison
Justice O'Connor has been very concerned about civics education, which is why she's created iCivics. It was launched as Our Courts, became iCivics last year, has been played over 2 million times since then. It's computer games from middle school and high school students and teachers to learn about civics how their government works and their own stake in it. So here's a question that we got from Jasmine Brown. She teaches eighth grade social studies with the aid of Justice O'Connor's iCivics material at Cesar Chavez Middle School in Lynwood.
Unknown Speaker
what sparked her what sparked her interest to create
the iCivics program? Because it's exactly what I
Pat Morrison
needed it led led to this process.
Sandra Day O'Connor
Well, what led to it is in the years that I served on the court, my colleagues there and I were aware of an increasing number of statements from people across the country and proposals in Congress of the United States and proposals in state legislatures to somehow affect judges, there was lots of criticism of judges. They were called secular godless humanists trying to impose their will on the rest of us. I mean, that's a typical complaint. And so you're How do you deal with this if it exists? It's a lot of lack of understanding about the role of courts in general. I guess it's not surprising because courts do their work away from public places for the most part. We see legislators in action sometimes if we pay attention to the news, and we see the other branches of government and operation every day, police on the streets and so forth and so on. But unless you're have a case in court, you're not going to get in a courtroom. Or perhaps you're called as a juror, but not the young people. They wouldn't have been old enough to be called. So there is a lack of knowledge and understanding in general about courts. And I thought that it would be helpful perhaps to start a website and engage young people in learning about all three branches of government. I started with the judicial branch. But it quickly became apparent, I better not forget those other two branches. They do matter, I have to say, what are the
Pat Morrison
what are the most common misunderstandings that you encounter about courts or about what about the courts first and then about government in general,
Sandra Day O'Connor
like there's a total lack of understanding about what they do. And I think many Americans at all ages don't really understand what it is the courts do and how they work. So that's understandable, unless you've been a litigant record, not many of us add. Very, very few need them, but otherwise you don't go and they're there. If you're a jerk, then you learn something about it. And the if you get a chance to be a jerk now, when you grow up, you young people do it. Say yes, and go down there and you will have a very interesting experience. It's a great way to see what it is courts really do. And most The courts are involved deciding criminal cases. If someone is accused of a crime, they are entitled to a trial in court if they want it. If the person who says that's right, I did it unhealthy way you solve it right then and there without our trial. But if the person says, nope, I didn't do that. I'm not guilty of that, then they're entitled to a trial. And they are entitled to a trial before a jury if they want it. If they don't want a jury trial and may want to go to trial before the judge. That's all right. But most defendants who say they want a jury trial would prefer to go to trial before a jury rather than the judge. And that's when you really need to learn and understand the role of the courts. It's a very important role in our country.
Pat Morrison
How does iCivics work?
Sandra Day O'Connor
It's a website and I should explain first, that we got public schools in this country. Not until about the 1830s. When people began to say, look, the framers of our constitution wrote a marvelous constitution. They gave us a remarkable system of government. We're proud of it. But we need to teach all our young people what it's all about. So they can be part of it so that they can be knowledgeable citizens in and make use of it. And we need public schools they send and that started a movement to get public schools. There weren't any public schools when our Constitution was written, nothing. I mean, you can educate the kids at home or maybe some little community group got together, but we finally got public schools and for many years for at least a century, the school started their number one goal is to teach young people how the government work. What does the constitution say? How does it work? How am I affected as a citizen? Well, with the passage of time, after we got public schools, some of the states started saying, well, we don't really need to teach about civics. I mean, we don't need to do that. We don't need to make it a requirement. Everybody understands that. And we saw more and more schools dropping in today, there are 20 states in the United States that no longer make the teaching of civics and government a requirement.
Pat Morrison
Okay, out of how many states everybody out of how many? All right, good
Unknown Speaker
for you too many.
Sandra Day O'Connor
But see, that's too many states that aren't doing it at all. And even the states that are teaching civics today are not necessarily making it engaging. Now I grew up on a radio In a remote part of Arizona, we didn't have a town or a school or anything. And when it came time for me to go to school, my parents sent me to El Paso, Texas, to live with grandparents. So I could go to school there, which is what I did. And we had civics every year, I got so tired of it. And all we learned about was Stephen F. Austin, Texas hero and so forth. And I got pretty tired or bad after eight years or so. So it can be a subject that isn't engaging. And so when I felt that we were having this gap when schools and states were stopping teaching civics, that maybe it was a gap I can help fill. And I thought, because I think it's so important, just crucial. And so I talked to some of my colleagues on the court, and we've talked about what might be done. And the idea of creating a website came up how many of you go to a website, sometimes on a Computer. We that's what we all do these days. So we thought a website might be helpful. And we started with one just dealing with the judicial branch, because that's had been where I was working. And I was used to that. And that's how we began. And we thought, did you know that young people in those middle school grades spend an average of 40 hours a week in front of a screen. Now, it might be TV, or it might be computer or some combination of the two. That's a lot 40 hours. And I only need about an hour for me to teach something. So we decided to target that and to target and I love middle schoolers. That's what I also wanted to target. And I'll tell you why. By the time you're in middle school, fifth through eighth, and sometimes nine. You're Head and brain Earth's biggest they're going to be okay. They're there. You've got your brain. You've craft your head. It's fastened on tight.
Unknown Speaker
We Oh,
Sandra Day O'Connor
yeah, we hope so. And at middle school level, the young people are still interested. They're engaged. They want to learn about things. They're not bored teenagers, they're eager to learn. Okay, I like that. And the hormones haven't totally kicked in yet, like they do
Pat Morrison
in high school when I see you all looking at each other out there.
Sandra Day O'Connor
So, to me, that's the ideal audience. And that's what I tried to gear it to and we started and then I thought to get them engaged. You know what the young people do when they get online on the computer, if they aren't texting each other. They like to play games. Okay, I can live with that. We can teach by making games to teach. So that's what we did, and targeted middle school and I just thought that was a good solution to a lot of problems.
Pat Morrison
How many of you here have done the iCivics game online? Let's hear some applause what good bad Look at that.
Justice Sandra Day O'Connor is with us along with students of a half dozen schools. In the Crawford family forum talking about AI civic civic education, you can find a link to the I civics web page and see a slideshow of those classrooms using the iCivics program on the website at KP cc.org on Pat Morris, and we'll be back in just a second.
Unknown Speaker
These students come in with this perception that the government does nothing because our students aren't voting yet. And they don't think the government affects them. One of the things that I have them do is say what does the government do for you? And a lot of them sit there and stare at each other. You'll eventually get a student says oh well 300 News lunch. Oh, well, what about school? Then we start piling into fixing the roads, police and the fire and parks by having them realize that they are affected by government now that's a big eye opener for them. And what else does the government do? How has decisions of the past Brown versus Board of Education Roe v. Wade affected them now?
Pat Morrison
I'm Pat Morrison in the Crawford family forum.
with former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor talking about her eyes, civics program and all things educational about the judiciary and government. That was the voice of Marissa Samuel. She's an advanced placement government teacher at North View High School in Covina. And what you just heard Justice O'Connor is probably pretty classic, pretty characteristic about how students think that government is so detached from their lives.
Sandra Day O'Connor
I know but it is, you know, it's some level of government in your state that says you have to go
Unknown Speaker
to school.
Sandra Day O'Connor
Did you know that I mean, that's why you have to go to school. may set the number of days that you have to go and the hours that you have to go and the conditions there. I mean, government is involved in every aspect of it, and they decide what has to be taught. So you're, once you start school, you're personally involved with government in many ways, and you're not even aware of it. You just think, Oh, I'm going to school. I don't. What's government got to do with? It has a lot to do with it. How did you put together the contents of the civics? Well, I got the Genius Award winner GMG. And I got all this group of teachers who were fabulous from all over the country saying what we had to focus on and we got a couple of games produced. And I was pretty excited with it.
Pat Morrison
We're talking about the iCivics program that has expanded out from just teaching about the judiciary. We're going to be hearing questions from some of some of the students who are actually here today joining us as well, but I'd like to to hear you Your epiphany when you realize that some of the attacks on the court and just the undermining of the concept of government were becoming dangerous to the processes. You spoke to the Ninth Circuit Court here, concerned about what you alluded to at the beginning that people simply use the court as a punching bag.
Sandra Day O'Connor
Well, I became very concerned about all the attacks in Congress, in state legislative bodies and around the country and all the things that were being said about judges that I thought demonstrated lack of understanding and knowledge. And a number of my colleagues on the court agreed with me, they thought it was a real problem. And we, I had I got help from some of my colleagues on the court, and we put together a conference and we invited important, well recognized speakers from all across the country to come to that conference. I think we had about 150 people layer and very distinguished people and we put on a program designed to focus on what was being said around the country? What was being exhibited? And what were their thoughts? Did they think people in our country understand what courts do? And if not what we what should we do? It was a very good conference. It was wonderful. And it was really as the result of back that I am my colleagues who had helped me put this together thought, well, maybe a website could be put together that would help focus on what it is courts do, and judges do, and try to correct misunderstandings and try to provide a basis of knowledge for young people. And that's how we started, we got a little support to put together some games dealing initially just with courts, and frankly, it was terrific. And we decided, well, there are those other two branches on
Pat Morrison
you know, I don't know if we came in all three of those scenarios ideal.
Sandra Day O'Connor
I've served in all three To tell you the truth. So we decided We better include the other two too. And that's what we've done. And we've had to go back and get additional people who are good at producing games and additional advice from our group of teachers who understand what's needed. And I'm very pleased with the result.
Pat Morrison
Some of the people have been critical of the courts are people who should know better. These are people who are in government themselves. And they've proposed things like elected federal judge ships and getting rid of that's
Sandra Day O'Connor
not going anyplace the framers of the Constitution, ladies, the framers of our constitution provided that federal judges will be appointed by the president with the advice and consent of the Senate. And it has worked very well for our nation. Andrew Jackson was not elected President of the United States a few years back. And he was a we call him a populist. He believed in popular decisions about government. He said, Look, as states we don't have to have a point of view Judges, we ought to elect our judges. And he went around the country trying to get states to change to election of their state judges. And the first state to go along with that proposition was Georgia. And we ended up with a hodgepodge. And a number of states and the United States do this day, elect their judges. That's what we did in Arizona, among others. And I thought, a big mistake. So when I thought in the state legislature in Arizona, we drafted an amendment to Arizona's constitution to provide for a merit selection system. So we went to a merit selection system in Arizona and still have it and the quality of our judges really went up. Now you have that in California, for the most part, not totally, you've got a hodgepodge of California do, but many of the courts in California are our American merit selection system to and all your
Pat Morrison
appellate courts are one of the question It's come up about you talk about transparency with the court is maybe a taping for broadcast, you know, video the the proceedings of federal courts in general, the Supreme Court in particular,
Sandra Day O'Connor
it's up to the court if it wants to allow cameras in the courtroom. At the supreme court level, every oral argument is tape recorded and it can be available at very night. Instant. So, and there's a written record of every statement that's made in the court and all the quiz all of that is available. So it's hardly secret. The one thing that's missing is television. We don't get back, but your program isn't televised. So you don't object a bad I'm sure.
Pat Morrison
Can I be Can I be the fourth branch of government? What can I be the fourth branch of government?
Sandra Day O'Connor
Well, just what do you have in mind?
Pat Morrison
I'll settle for what the founders have to say.
Sandra Day O'Connor
Yeah. And they didn't they didn't have much say about
Pat Morrison
the what difference Do you think it makes in the quality of the judiciary Having judges appointed and even lifetime appointments versus that election process you talked about,
Sandra Day O'Connor
I just think what we have experienced at the federal level and among the states that use Merricks election, is that you get better qualified judges, you really do. It's odd how when you have a totally election process, sometimes the voters just focusing on the last name. Brown is much more likely to be elected than somebody named. Abramovich, for instance. It's funny people go for certain simplified names as opposed to something more complicated, even though it might be that Mr. Brown is a terrible candidate, and the other one is a good one. So you can run into problems with elections just for the crazy thing about the name of the person.
Pat Morrison
How do you think the change has been in the courts with the addition of more women minorities to the bench.
Sandra Day O'Connor
I don't know that women decide anything differently than men. I doubt that they do. But what is important is that we are an electorate, we are people in the United States and 50%
Pat Morrison
are women.
Sandra Day O'Connor
Like it or not, there they are. We women kind of like to see women represented in our legislative bodies and in public office. And yes, even on the bench in courts, we like to see that. And I think that's what matters. It isn't that there's some difference in the way women and men decide cases or that they'd reach different results, but we were comprised 50% women or we like to see some in office where it matters.
Pat Morrison
Here's the question from one of our students, who is high school senior and
Unknown Speaker
I'm a senior at North View High School. I'm 17 years old and I live in Covina. Justice O'Connor, what were the biggest challenges you had to overcome to become a Supreme Court justice as a female?
Sandra Day O'Connor
I never intended to be a Supreme Court justice. I never had it on my list my to do list. I was in Arizona, and I served in all three branches of Arizona's government and at the time, I was chosen by President Ronald Reagan. To fill a vacancy on the Supreme Court. I was serving on the Arizona Court of Appeals. And I didn't have it as a goal to sit on the US Supreme Court. It just happened. And I think the whole nation was surprised but so was I.
Pat Morrison
You got something like 60,000 letters in your first year? Were these all sort of You go girl letters?
Sandra Day O'Connor
Well, I think there were a few I remember a letter from some disgruntled sounding man saying, back to your husband, I'm kitchen woman. Wow, you don't belong here. And so you know, you've got kind of a mixed bag, but I think most of the letters were very positive.
Pat Morrison
We had talked about some of the influences on the court and the political the politicization, the partisanship that has been pressured on the court. And and the question that comes to my mind is about the hearings, the televised hearings that are kind of a grueling process now for the Supreme Court Justice nominees.
Sandra Day O'Connor
You're talking about that. The confirmation confirmation hearings, yes.
Pat Morrison
From the
Sandra Day O'Connor
former federal judges, including Justice of the Supreme Court. The process is that the President makes the nomination subject to Senate confirmation. Now the senate can do what it wants. It can go into session and not talked about nominee at all. Just go into session and say Do we want this person yes or no. In the early days of the country, that's what happened all the time. In the early days, the people nominated were often people that the senators knew Anyway, there weren't that many people in the country in those days. And you might have a nomination sent over on Monday. And on Wednesday, the Senate would vote up or down. And that was that. But it was at a time when about the time justice Frankfurter was nominated to the court. There began to be more discussion about the justices and whether they should have been confirmed. And then some of the members of the US Senate start started saying, Oh, we got we gotta call them in and talk to them. But that didn't happen first. First. They have them submit written statements to the Senate. The nominees, they started that way with asking the nominee to present written statements covering certain topics ban, some of us senator said, Well, we ought to call a man and be able to ask them a few questions. And that began, and it has never ended. Now, it now with there is TV coverage of those hearings. And with that, the senators on the committee love it, my Lord, do you know how much money it costs the senators when they're running for office to be on TV? Oh, a fortune. Now here, they can hold these senate hearings and the longer they prolong them, the better and they can be in front of the public on television day in and day out for as long as they can extend the earrings. They love it.
Pat Morrison
It's not going to go away. And they get to ask questions. Doesn't matter what the answer is, but they're asking questions on TV. Yeah,
Sandra Day O'Connor
may get their staff to help them right area diet questions, so they look pretty good. There you go.
Pat Morrison
Should that be done away with what you should that process that televised process be done away with
Sandra Day O'Connor
the call? going to happen. You think the senators would drop that? Not a chance, not worth
Pat Morrison
talking about? Here's a question about the responsibility of a Supreme Court justice and a decision making. My name is Reuben, like me, Cesar Chavez Middle School, how does it feel knowing that your decisions would affect the whole nation, if not just a certain group of people? How does it feel to have that responsibility in your head?
Sandra Day O'Connor
You can imagine it is an enormous responsibility to know that you are one of only nine votes on the United States Supreme Court bench, deciding an issue that in some cases, is an issue that everyone every citizen in the United States cares about. And a decision that will affect things for men on and that's a huge responsibility. And what it means is you have to be as well informed as you possibly can be About the arguments pro and con and about the precedents in the past, previous Supreme Court decisions that have touched on that precise area of the law, you have to understand thoroughly the arguments on both sides and think about a card it is a huge responsibility. Get we take it seriously,
Pat Morrison
given that there are fewer than 30 amendments to the Constitution. I think that's right, you will correct me if I'm wrong there. It's suggested that it's a pretty flexible document, then there's that scale of thinking that it is a document that is perfect, and that applies to every circumstance, literally, versus the more figurative interpretation. Where do you find yourself on that?
Sandra Day O'Connor
So in the first place, it only deals with certain federal principles it doesn't deal with every day, things that affect you in the state of California or county. in which you live or things like that. It's limited to issues of federal law. And it's just it's a very big responsibility that the court has to try to reach sound, appropriate decisions based on the President's now, we are a common law country. Not many people know what that means. Great Britain is a common law of country, and we patterned our lead legal system after that. And in a common law country, the decisions of a Supreme Court become binding precedent on subsequent courts, you aren't deciding the issue all over again, in when it comes up in a different context, that becomes part and parcel of the law, the decision of the court. And so over a period of 100 years, you have a lot of decisions that have become part of the law, and you have to understand that man, so every time I The court has to decide some issue of federal law. It's adding to that structure that's binding forever more unless the court changes its mind later on once in a while it does. And
Pat Morrison
I want to ask you about that in a little bit. But people will say, look that when the founders were around, there weren't computers, there weren't cars. So how does the constitution apply to now?
Sandra Day O'Connor
Same as it applies to anything else same as it applied to somebody riding horseback back in the 1800s. Same deal. Doesn't matter. Sandra dates and the issue of federal law
Pat Morrison
Barry are Sandra Day O'Connor, the first woman justice on the Supreme Court and the creator of the iCivics program, which many students, actually millions of students now play in the classroom to learn about how government works. And to dispel some of the misunderstandings about government. There's a link to the iCivics web page and a slideshow to classrooms using the program on the website at kpcc.org. We'll be back with our students in Teachers here in the audience in the Crawford family forum. I'm Pat Morrison and the Crawford family forum with students and teachers. We're talking to former Justice Sandra Day O'Connor of the Supreme Court, who's created the I civics program to teach young people a justice age about how government works. Thank you again for joining us.
Sandra Day O'Connor
My pleasure.
Pat Morrison
We have a question from again from a student. She's 17 years old about how the court does its business and you in particular,
Unknown Speaker
my name is Nancy Nava. I'm 17 years old. I'm a senior at Northfield High School. How has it been difficult separating your personal beliefs for making decisions on a case?
Sandra Day O'Connor
People often ask me that kind of question. Well,
Unknown Speaker
what if the
Sandra Day O'Connor
legal answer is something that as a person you don't agree with? You don't think that's right. You know, that doesn't trouble me at all. What's binding is the Constitution of the United States, whether I agree or not, whether you agree or not. Not if it says that that's what it is. And if the Supreme Court in prior decisions, has said, This is what it means, even if I don't like that, I'm bound by it. So it doesn't trouble me. I agree when I take an oath of office to serve on the Supreme Court to abide by the constitution and laws of the United States, so help me God. So it doesn't matter if I don't agree. That's fine.
Pat Morrison
Are there cases where you've had that carrot, one character on one shoulder, one character on the other the Constitution in the personal case, both talking in your ears?
Sandra Day O'Connor
what I'm telling you is, the personal doesn't matter. I put a stopper in that.
Pat Morrison
Here's another question from a student more about the long term impacts of court decisions.
Unknown Speaker
My name is Lucy Cavalli, I'm a senior in high school in Covina has it been difficult to decide on taking a course case when you know we'll have a long term impact,
Sandra Day O'Connor
it isn't more difficult to decide you it's the same issue whether it has a short term impact or a long term, all the decisions of the Supreme Court have an effect a long term impact, and they're going to remain a statement of what the laws unless and until a subsequent court, overturns it, or if it's a matter for congressional action, a subsequent Congress makes a different rule. So that's, we understand that that's okay. It's all right. rules of the game. You play some games, you play tennis or rugby or soccer or football, their rules and you may not like it, you may not like how it affects you, but we follow them Don't be same deal on courts. How
Pat Morrison
maybe you can explain for all of us how courts the decisions may change The impact over time whether it's a law that comes out of Congress like mccain feingold, in which your subsequent case the McConnell case upheld the regulation of soft money. Now we've had subsequent decisions like Citizens United, how courts can change their minds, in a way the interpretation over the course of decades,
Sandra Day O'Connor
The Supreme Court can change its mind over time. The most prominent example arises out of schools, that's what you're interested in. And for a long time, it was held by courts, including the Supreme Court that it was all right, to segregate schools on the basis of race. Make all African American students go to one school, and all other students and other that was upheld for years as being perfectly within the meaning of the Constitution. And eventually, the us supreme court concluded in brown versus Board of Education, that that was wrong. That was just wrong.
And it was high time that Court made that decision. And it was a decision that was hard to enforce in certain parts of the country. It got very traumatic. In fact, troops had to be sent to Little Rock, Arkansas to open the school doors in Little Rock to students of all races, and it was high time that that happened. But occasionally, there are situations where the Supreme Court says, look, we decided x, and it turns out years later, we were wrong. So we're going to correct it. That can happen.
Pat Morrison
Of co