Sandra Day O'Connor

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• Born: 26 March 1930
• Birthplace: El Paso, Texas
• Best Known As: The first woman on the U.S Supreme Court

Name at birth: Sandra Day

Sandra Day O'Connor was the first woman ever to sit on the United States Supreme Court. O'Connor earned undergraduate and law degrees from Stanford University and eventually settled in Arizona. She served the state as an assistant attorney general, state senator, and finally as a superior court judge. Governor Bruce Babbitt raised her to the Arizona Court of Appeals in 1979, and in 1981 President Ronald Reagan nominated her for the U.S. Supreme Court. She was confirmed by the Senate 99-0 and sworn in on 25 September 1981, becoming the first female justice in the court's history. Over time she earned a reputation on the bench as a moderate conservative and a key figure in court decisions related to the issue of abortion. On 1 July 2005 she announced her retirement, saying she would not return for the October session; she was succeeded by Samuel Alito in 2006.

She married John J. O'Connor III on 20 December 1952 in El Paso, Texas. They had met when both were law students at Stanford University. They had three children: Scott (born 1957), Jay (b. 1960), and Brian (b. 1962). John O'Connor developed Alzheimer's Disease late in life and was placed in a nursing home in 2007... On 19 July 2005, President George W. Bush nominated John G. Roberts, Jr. to replace O'Connor on the court, but before Roberts could be confirmed, Chief Justice William Rehnquist died; Roberts was nominated to the post of Chief Justice and President Bush nominated his confidante Harriet Miers to replace O'Connor. After resistance from the Senate, Miers withdrew her name and Judge Samuel Alito was then nominated and confirmed... O'Connor replaced Justice Potter Stewart, who retired on 3 July 1981 after 23 years on the court.. Other Reagan appointees to the Supreme Court included Antonin Scalia (1986) and Anthony Kennedy (1988)... The Supreme Court's second female justice, Ruth Bader Ginsberg, was appointed by Bill Clinton and took the oath of office on 10 August 1993.

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(b. El Paso, Tex., 26 Mar. 1930), associate justice, 1981–. Nominated by President Ronald Reagan and unanimously approved by the Senate, Sandra Day O'Connor joined the Court on 25 September 1981 as its 102nd justice and first female appointee.

The oldest of three children, O'Connor grew up on the Lazy B, the family's 160,000 acre ranch in southern Arizona and New Mexico. Her father, Harry A. Day, was an excellent student and California high school swimming champion whose plan to attend college yielded first to military service in World War I and then to management of the Lazy B ranch when his father became ill. Her mother, Ada Mae Wilkey Day, attended the University of Arizona and was an intelligent, caring woman devoted to the family's well‐being. The challenge of ranch life against the stark beauty of the southwestern desert instilled in the future justice her lifelong values of determination, honesty, hard work, and service to others.

After attending boarding school in El Paso, O'Connor entered Stanford at the age of sixteen. At the end of her junior year, she was accepted for early admission to Stanford Law School, where she graduated in 1952, third in her class behind the valedictorian, William H. Rehnquist. She met her husband, John O'Connor, while they were both law students at Stanford. They have three sons.

Like many other justices, O'Connor's path to the Court encompassed both the practice of law and politics. While her husband served in West Germany in the Judge Advocate General's Corps, she worked as a civilian quartermaster corps staff attorney. Returning to Arizona, O'Connor was an assistant attorney general from 1965 to 1969, when the governor appointed her to fill a vacancy in the Arizona Senate. Within three years she was the first woman in the United States to be a state senate majority leader. In 1974 she moved from state politics to the bench with her election to the Maricopa County Superior Court, where she was seen as a “rising star.” Her judicial demeanor, legal knowledge, and popularity led to an appointment to the Arizona Court of Appeals in 1979.

Active in Republican Party politics, O'Connor supported Ronald Reagan in his 1976 attempt to gain the presidential nomination over Gerald Ford. In 1981, at a time when the role of women in American society was growing, President Reagan‘s appointment of O'Connor fulfilled a campaign promise to appoint a woman to the Court. That opportunity came with the resignation of Potter Stewart.

From the outset, O'Connor was committed to conservative values: adherence to the “rule of law” to ensure that social change is deliberate and incremental; the exercise of judicial restraint to give proper heed to the legislative process; a theory of federalism that recognizes the primacy of states' rights; and the safeguarding of certain personal freedoms that must remain beyond the reach of government. In general, her votes on cases have been closely aligned with Chief Justice Rehnquist. In the 2003 term, they agreed over 80 percent of the time. Nevertheless, O'Connor's commitment to the constitutional mandate of “case and controversy” has been such that she is not identified with a particular ideology as much as she appears committed to a careful analysis of the facts and issues presented. Perhaps her view of the law is summarized in her comment in *Rosenberger v. Rector and Visitors of the University of Virginia (1995): “When bedrock principles collide, they test the limits of categorical obstinacy and expose the flaws and dangers of a Grand Unified Theory that may turn out to be neither grand nor unified.” With this reputation for case‐by‐case decision making, she is perceived as a possible “swing vote” in high profile cases. In McConnell v. Federal Election Commission (2003), for example, O'Connor parted ways with Rehnquist and Scalia and their free speech arguments, agreeing instead with a five‐justice majority that regulation of campaign activity, not speech, was the core issue and that Congress's political expertise in the federal election process was entitled to deference by the Court.

O'Connor has shaped constitutional law in several areas including affirmative action, voting rights, church‐and‐state issues, takings under the Fifth Amendment, states' rights, and abortion. In one sense, her tenure on the bench and the sheer volume of her published opinions might suggest an “evolving” or “dynamic” jurisprudence on her part. On the other hand, there is much to support the notion that O'Connor has not changed her thinking as much as she has employed collegiality and the use of concurring opinions to bring the other justices over to her point of view.

In affirmative action cases, O'Connor's judicial philosophy has accommodated both text and social context. In Wygant v. Jackson Board of Education (1986), nonminority teachers challenged a policy that used race as a basis in determining layoffs. Because the statute overlooked the more limited use of hiring controls to address discrimination, a plurality of the Court held the policy violated the Equal Protection Clause. In her concurring opinion, O'Connor highlighted the majority's apparent consensus that race‐based classifications were constitutionally suspect regardless of their objective and reiterated that the proper inquiry was whether the challenged statute was narrowly drawn and survived strict scrutiny. This concurrence in Wygant was the basis of her majority opinions in subsequent cases that have substantially rewritten the law of affirmative action. In Richmond v. J. A. Croson Co. (1989), she applied Wygant to strike down an ordinance that required 30 percent of city contracting work go to minority‐owned businesses where there was no factual basis to connect the ordinance's remedial goals to local discrimination. In *Adarand Constructors, Inc. v. Peña (1995), an O'Connor opinion placed Fifth Amendment and Fourteenth Amendment claims on the same footing and required both federal and state contract set‐aside programs to undergo “strict scrutiny” analysis for equal protection purposes.

Two higher education cases, both 5‐to‐4 decisions, reconfirmed the role played by cultural diversity with regard to remedial affirmative action programs. In *Grutter v. Bollinger (2003), O'Connor authored the majority opinion that found a compelling state interest in promoting diversity and upheld the University of Michigan Law School's “narrowly tailored” admission policy that allowed race‐based consideration of an applicant's credentials. In Gratz v. Bollinger (2003), decided the same day, she joined a different majority to hold that, in the context of undergraduate admissions, an automatic award of admission points to minority applicants did not pass muster under the Equal Protection Clause.

In voting‐rights cases, viewpoints from her early years on the bench have ostensibly resurfaced and taken hold. In Davis v. Bandemer (1986), O'Connor dissented from the majority's holding that political gerrymandering claims were justiciable under the Equal Protection Clause. For her, the judiciary, as a coequal branch of government, was neither constitutionally authorized nor practically equipped to oversee an inherently political and policy‐laden process. In Vieth v. Jubelirer (2004), the Court again journeyed into the political thicket of legislative apportionment, but this time declined to find that partisan gerrymandering claims presented justiciable equal protection violations. O'Connor's abstentionist approach in Bandemer garnered three additional votes and set the framework for Anthony Kennedy's due process–based concurrence. In contrast, in Shaw v. Reno (1993), O'Connor still recognized a distinction in voting‐rights cases where the claim involved racial gerrymandering. Writing for a five‐justice majority, she opined that legislative‐apportionment schemes designed to protect voting rights against race‐based abuse might be valid if they satisfied strict scrutiny and narrowly drawn standards, but still cautioned against oddly shaped districts and the greater social harm that might arise from the very process of racial classifications.

In an Establishment Clause case, Lynch v. Donnelly (1984), decided during her third year on the Court, she offered “endorsement” analysis as a reformulation of the three‐prong test in Lemon v. Kurtzman (1971). This endorsement analysis was used in County of *Allegheny v. ACLU (1989) and it informed the Court's later approval of elementary school student voucher programs in Zelman v. Simmons‐Harris (2002).

The Takings Clause received fact‐intensive and insightful analysis by O'Connor in Eastern Enterprises v. Apfel (1998). Writing for the majority, she accepted the argument that an improper taking arose from Congress's attempt to fund lifetime health benefits under the Coal Industry Retiree Health Benefit Act of 1992 because Eastern had left the coal industry in 1965 and could not have foreseen future liability by subsequently enacted legislation. In reaching this conclusion, her examination of the Takings Clause correlated the issues of retroactivity, investment‐return expectations, disproportionate impact, and the notion of economic fairness set forth in Armstrong v. United States (1960). In contrast to Eastern, she ruled in favor of the legislature's eminent domain authority in Hawaii Housing Authority v. Midkiff (1984), where the issue was the meaning of the Fifth Amendment's “public use” requirement. In the mid‐1960s, the Hawaii Legislature discovered that almost 50 percent of its island real estate was in the hands of seventy‐two private landowners. To remedy the stifling economic effects of this land oligarchy, the state devised a plan by which residential tracts were condemned and then resold to tenant‐homeowners. For O'Connor, the legislature, not the judiciary, was best equipped to determine land‐use policy and its determinations were entitled to validation. The “public‐use” requirement could be satisfied even though private ownership would result since the overall purpose of the taking was to promote the general welfare.

In a states' rights case, New York v. United States (1992), her methodical analysis of the Tenth Amendment invalidated federal legislation that would have compelled New York to take possession of low‐level radioactive wastes. In Seminole Tribe of Florida v. Florida (1996), she sided with a five‐justice majority in sustaining Florida's Eleventh Amendment claim that Congress could not use the Indian Commerce Clause to abrogate state immunity from suit.

In the area of abortion rights, she was the focal point of much public debate when the basic holding of Roe v. Wade (1973) was tested in *Planned Parenthood v. Casey (1992). Again in a 5‐to‐4 decision, O'Connor departed from her conservative stripes and applied the “undue burden” standard she first offered in her dissent in Akron v. Akron Center for Reproductive Health, Inc. (1983). Conceding the government some regulatory control over the abortion decision with regard to informed consent and parental approval provisions, her opinion for a splintered majority in Casey nevertheless upheld Roe’s recognition of a “liberty” interest in a woman's right to choose.

In terms of percentages, O'Connor files the fewest dissents compared to the other justices. That she endeavors to work to consensus perhaps underscores the significance of her disagreements with the majority. In Blakely v. Washington (2004), the Court struck down a state sentence enhancement scheme that allowed the judge, not the jury, to determine facts that increased the penalty above the statutory limit. Consistent with her dissent in Apprendi v. New Jersey (2000), O'Connor decried the majority's misunderstanding of the proper role of the judge and jury and chided its subversion of much‐needed sentencing guidelines that mediate an overloaded criminal justice system.

As American society continues to change and pose even more difficult legal questions with regard to the role of government and the rights of the individual, O'Connor's contribution to the Court will no doubt receive considerable attention and reexamination. Legal scholars may well debate whether she is unique in how she unpredictably combines both centrist and independent viewpoints in her opinions. Her views on law and society will set the contours of future pronouncements of the Court and she will continue to gain in stature as a great jurist.

Bibliography

• Henry J. Abraham, Justices, Presidents, and Senators (1999).
• Nancy Maveety, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor: Strategist on the Supreme Court (1996).
• Sandra Day O'Connor and H. Alan Day, Lazy B (2002).
• Sandra Day O'Connor, The Majesty of the Law (2003). Symposium: Justice O'Connor: Twenty Years of Shaping Constitutional Law, McGeorge Law Review 32 (2001): 821–956

— George T. Anagnost

In 1981 Sandra Day O'Connor (born 1930) became the first woman to serve as a justice of the United States Supreme Court.

During the final month of the 1980 presidential campaign, candidate Ronald Reagan, whose polls disclosed a lack of support among female voters, announced that, if elected, he would appoint a woman to the Supreme Court. In July 1981 President Reagan kept that promise, nominating Sandra Day O'Connor to become the first female justice in the 191-year history of the court.

Born on August 26, 1930, Sandra Day spent her earliest years on her family's Lazy B Ranch in southeastern Arizona. She was considered a "child of the frontier" as her first home had no electricity or running water. She grew up branding steer, learning to fix whatever was broken and absorbing the influence of her family's vast Arizona cattle ranch built on former Apache land.

Then, because of parental concern that this obviously bright girl could not get an adequate education in rural schools, she went to live with her maternal grandmother in El Paso, Texas. There she attended the private Radford School for girls and Austin High. In 1946 she enrolled at Stanford University, where she studied economics and graduated magna cum laudein 1950. A year before receiving her B.A. she entered the law school, from which she received an LL.B. in 1952. A member of the board of editors of the Stanford Law Review, Day graduated third in a class of 102, two places behind her future Supreme Court colleague William H. Rehnquist.

Pre-Court Career

Despite her outstanding academic record, she failed in efforts to obtain employment as a lawyer with San Francisco and Los Angeles law firms because she was a woman. The only one willing to hire the future justice at all offered her a job as a legal secretary. Instead, she took a position as a deputy county attorney in San Mateo, California. When her new husband, John O'Connor, who was one class behind her at Stanford, finished law school the couple headed for Germany, where he served as an attorney in the Army, and she worked as a civilian quartermaster corps attorney, specializing in contracts.

Upon their return to the United States the O'Connors settled in the Phoenix, Arizona area. O'Connor and another lawyer opened a law office in suburban Maryvale, but for the next few years she devoted most of her time to rearing the three sons who were born between 1957 and 1962. She also served as a bankruptcy trustee, wrote bar exam questions, set up a lawyer referral service, served on a county zoning appeal board and a governor's committee on marriage and the family, did volunteer work with several civic and charitable organizations, and took an active role in local Republican politics.

In 1965 O'Connor returned to full-time employment as one of Arizona's assistant attorneys general. She remained active in civic affairs, and when the state senator from her district resigned in 1969 Governor Jack Williams appointed her to the seat. She won election to it in 1970 and was easily reelected in 1972. As a state senator O'Connor compiled a moderate to conservative voting record and sufficiently impressed her Republican colleagues that in 1972 they chose her as their majority leader, making her the first woman anywhere in the country to hold that position.

In 1974 O'Connor left the legislature, running successfully for a judgeship in the Maricopa County Superior Court. Although remaining active in Republican politics, she resisted when party leaders tried to persuade her to challenge Democratic Governor Bruce Babbitt in 1978. The following year Babbitt appointed her to the Arizona Court of Appeals. When Reagan selected her for the Supreme Court she became the first appointee in 24 years with prior service on a state court and the first in 32 years with legislative experience.

Supreme Court Justice

It was largely because she was the first woman ever nominated that she was quickly and unanimously confirmed by the Senate. As a justice, her upbringing was expected to keep her solidly conservative and push her into the states-rights camp in court decisions. But her inability to get a job after graduating from law school because she was a woman influenced her as well, and was a point of contention for right-wing conservatives who objected to her appointment for fear she would not oppose abortion.

There was a certain irony in this, for O'Connor was not part of the organized women's movement. After giving early support to the Equal Rights Amendment, she had backed away from it when the opposition of Arizona's two Republican senators became clear. Although the Moral Majority complained that O'Connor was a proponent of abortion, she had cast votes against as well as for it in the legislature. As a justice she aligned herself with its opponents.

Although not a militant feminist, O'Connor was a founder of both the Arizona Women Lawyers Association and the National Association of Women Judges and had fought to eliminate provisions discriminating against women from her state's bar rules and community property laws. On the Court she quickly established a reputation as a judicial opponent of sex discrimination. Her most famous early opinion was Mississippi University for Women v. Hogan (1982), in which the Court held it was unconstitutional for a state nursing school to refuse to admit men.

On other issues Justice O'Connor generally aligned herself with the Court's two most conservative members, Chief Justice Warren Burger and Associate Justice Rehnquist. Exhibiting a strong commitment to law and order, she consistently voted against criminal defendants. However, her response to First Amendment claims were lukewarm at best. As her background on the state bench and an article she had written at about the time of her appointment suggested, she opposed further extensions of federal court jurisdiction. Although part of a conservative bloc on most issues, she did break with it occasionally, as on freedom of information matters. Despite his own far more liberal voting record, Justice Harry Blackman quickly concluded O'Connor was a "fine justice, able and articulate."

Second Decade on the Court

During her years following her appointment by Reagan in 1981, O'Connor followed a pattern that has sometimes confounded presidents attempting to solidify political leanings in the Supreme Court. By 1990, following her first decade on the court she, along with fellow Justice Anthony Kennedy, had become an unpredictable swing vote, her opinions courted by both sides in many decisions.

As the 1990s unfolded, O'Connor was influential or determined the direction of a number of key freedom rulings by the Supreme Court. They included an interpretation of Freedom of Speech, censorship, a ruling governing the Internet and cases dealing with freedom of religion where she was instrumental in striking down a state-mandated moment of silence in public schools.

She influenced the court's direction in cases involving discrimination and harassment because of gender, strengthening women's job opportunity rights. However, she was the swing vote in a decision that narrowed the scope of affirmative action in Adarand v. Pena. And, in 1995, she sided with conservative justices in cases, particularly Miller v. Johnson, that weakened the Voting Rights Act's congressional district apportionment designed to favor minority representation.

She voted with the majority to strike down the core of the federal Brady Act anti-gun legislation requiring background checks of prospective gun purchasers.

In a 1992 challenge to abortion rights, Planned Parenthood v. Casey, O'Connor was one of the majority who voted to uphold the provisions of Roe v. Wade that made abortion legal for women. In 1997, she ruled against another privacy issue: A terminally ill patient's right to die through physician-assisted suicide.

In a U.S. News & World Report story, "The Geography of Justice: Big Decisions by the Supreme Court Turn on the Regional Backgrounds of the Justices," (July, 1997), a former law clerk hinted at the basis for many of O'Connor's decisions. According to the clerk, the justice showed a "great admiration for individual initiative and people taking responsibility for their own actions…." That tendency to discount a need for special protections was called the basis of her voting against every race-based affirmative action issue that came before her.

Throughout many issues before the court, O'Connor stayed true to her roots, joining her fellow conservatives in 123 of 137 decisions by 1997. Although her decisions have not always been popular with feminists, she has served as an excellent role model to women in general. The justice herself became a news item in 1997 when a suspicious-looking package found on her doorstep was suspected of being a bomb. An investigation showed it only contained a pair of tennis shoes the justice had ordered.

Further Reading

Although there was a book-length biography of O'Connor designed for children, adults must look to periodicals for material. Robert E. Riggs, "Justice O'Connor: A First Term Appraisal," Brigham Young University Law Review 1983 (1983), provided an excellent analysis of her early performance on the Supreme Court. Vera Glaser, "She's a Lady," The Washingtonian 19 (May 1984), was informative on the personal side of O'Connor's life, and Beverly B. Cook, "Women as Supreme Court Candidates: From Florence Allen to Sandra Day O'Connor," Judicature 65 (December 1981-January 1982), provided a useful comparative perspective. Sandra Day O'Connor, "Trends in the Relationship Between the Federal and State Courts from the Perspective of a State Judge," William and Mary Law Review 22 (Summer 1981), provided limited insights into Justice O'Connor's own thinking. Related articles on Justice O'Connor can be found in U.S. News & World Report, July 7, 1997; Working Woman, November/ December 1996; Time, June 17, 1996; and People, March 7, 1994.

• Born: Mar. 26, 1930, El Paso, Tex.
• Education: Stanford College, B.A., 1950; Stanford University Law School, LLB., 1952
• Previous government service: assistant attorney general, Arizona, 1965–69; Arizona Senate, 1969–75, majority leader of the Arizona Senate, 1973–74; judge, Maricopa County Superior Court, Arizona, 1975–79; judge, Arizona Court of Appeals, 1979–81
• Appointed by President Ronald Reagan Aug. 19, 1981; replaced Potter Stewart, who retired
• Supreme Court term: confirmed by the Senate Sept. 21, 1981, by a 99–0 vote

Sandra Day O'Connor was the first woman to be appointed and confirmed to the U.S. Supreme Court. She was a brilliant student, and her record at Stanford University Law School was outstanding. However, she had difficulty, at first, in pursuing a career in the law because of her gender. She was an outstanding woman in a profession traditionally dominated by men. Many male lawyers did not want to work with women, and O'Connor had a hard time getting a job she wanted. One prominent law firm offered her a job as a secretary.

Through persistence and competence, O'Connor earned recognition as a lawyer, as a state senator in Arizona, and as a judge in the Arizona state court system. She also found time to raise three sons with her husband, John O'Connor.

In 1981, President Ronald Reagan appointed Sandra Day O'Connor to the U.S. Supreme Court. Justice O'Connor has appeared to resist overturning Roe v. Wade (1973), which granted women the right to have an abortion, although she has tended to narrow the scope of that decision by upholding state-level regulations “not unduly burdensome” to the woman. She has also shaped Supreme Court rulings on affirmative action and separation of church and state with regard to state government actions. She appears to favor strict neutrality over strict separation in the state's treatment of religion. And in response to state-level affirmative action cases, she has tended to favor a strict scrutiny test that would permit programs to rectify prior discrimination by the state government.

Justice O'Connor wrote the Court's first opinion to restrict the use of race as a category in determining the boundaries of state legislative and congressional districts (Shaw v. Reno, 1998). She has, however, expressed opposition to the complete removal of the consideration of race in redistricting cases, as long as it is not the primary factor in drawing boundaries of election districts (Bush v. Vera, 1996).

Sources

• Beverly B. Cook, “Justice Sandra Day O'Connor: “Transition to a Republican Court Agenda”,” in The Burger Court: Political and Judicial Profiles, edited by Charles M. Lamb and Stephen C. Halpern (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1991).
• Beverly Gherman, Sandra Day O'Connor: Justice for All (New York: Viking, 1991).
• Peter Huber, Sandra Day O'Connor (New York: Chelsea House, 1990).
• Nancy Maveety, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor: Strategist on the Supreme Court (Lanham, Md.: Rowman & Littlefield, 1996)

(1930- ), associate justice, U.S. Supreme Court. O'Connor was born in El Paso and completed both her undergraduate and law degrees at Stanford University. Before her appointment to the Supreme Court, she practiced law and served in the Arizona state senate (1969-1974) and on the Arizona bench (1974-1981). President Ronald Reagan nominated her as the first female justice of the United States in 1981, to replace retiring justice Potter Stewart.

O'Connor began her tenure on the Court as a conservative, voting with Justice William Rehnquist more than 90 percent of the time. But in her first decade on the federal bench, she proved herself an independent thinker. By 1990, she had become the pivotal center vote on a Court made up during those years of four liberals and four conservatives.

Her central role is best illustrated by cases involving the establishment clause of the First Amendment. Her view of that clause, which prohibits any law "respecting an establishment of religion," is that it prohibits any government action that is intended to send, or actually sends, a message endorsing religion. On the basis of this idiosyncratic test, she voted to uphold a public Christmas display including a crèche, but to strike down a public Christmas display of a crèche alone. In each case, her vote determined the outcome. She also provided the crucial fifth vote to strike down a state-mandated moment of silence at the beginning of the public school day.

Another example of her role as the center of the Court is affirmative action. Not only did she often cast the determining vote on the legality of a particular affirmative action program; she also fashioned the constitutional test that gained majority support in 1989. For fifteen years the Court was unable to produce a majority opinion in any constitutional case involving affirmative action. In 1989, in a case involving a "set-aside" program for minority businesses adopted by the city of Richmond, Virginia, Justice O'Connor wrote an opinion accepted almost in its entirety by a majority of the Court. Her opinion trod a middle course, validating affirmative action programs designed to combat prior governmental discrimination, but invalidating those designed to combat merely prior discrimination by the society at large.

O'Connor also provided the determinative vote in a series of cases on the still-developing question of the execution of juvenile or mentally retarded offenders. She voted twice to uphold such convictions and twice to strike them down. In each case her vote was the determinative one, and in each she wrote a separate concurrence to stress that her resolution of the case depended on the particular facts, not on any per se rule, again treading a middle course.

The Court's gender discrimination decisions have also been influenced by O'Connor. Since her appointment, the Court has declared both sexual harassment and sexual stereotyping to be forms of illegal gender discrimination and has upheld various state and local efforts to increase women's opportunities to participate in the labor force. O'Connor has always voted with the majority in these cases, often providing the necessary fifth vote. On one of the most important constitutional issues for women, O'Connor has generally voted to uphold restrictions on abortion, but she has simultaneously provided a moderating influence by refusing to overturn Roe v. Wade.

Thus O'Connor's propensity to make independent and politically moderate judgments gave her significant influence during her first decade on an increasingly polarized Court. As the Court moves further to the right, it remains to be seen whether she can continue to provide a moderating influence or will find herself more often in dissent.

Bibliography:

Richard M. Cordray and James I. Vradelis, "The Emerging Jurisprudence of Justice O'Connor," University of Chicago Law Review 52 (1985): 389; Barbara C. S. Shea, "Sandra Day O'Connor--Woman, Lawyer, Justice: Her First Four Terms on the Supreme Court," University of Missouri at Kansas City Law Review 55 (1986): 1; Suzanna Sherry, "Civic Virtue and the Feminine Voice in Constitutional Adjudication," Virginia Law Review 72 (1986): 543.

Author:

Suzanna Sherry

See also Supreme Court.

The first woman to serve on the Supreme Court, she was appointed by President Ronald Reagan in 1981.

Sandra Day O'Connor was appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court in 1981, becoming the first female justice. O'Connor has established herself as a moderate conservative who prefers narrow, limited holdings.

Sandra Day was born on March 26, 1930, in El Paso, Texas. She grew up in a remote part of southeastern Arizona where her parents had a 160,000-acre ranch. She spent her winters in El Paso, where she lived with her grandmother while attending school. In 1950 she graduated from Stanford University with a major in economics. She then attended Stanford Law School, where she graduated third in her class in 1952. William H. Rehnquist, who would later become her colleague on the U.S. Supreme Court, ranked first in the same law school class.

After law school she married John O'Connor, an attorney. She hoped to join a law firm in Los Angeles or San Francisco, but none was willing to hire a woman attorney, although one did offer her a position as legal secretary. Instead O'Connor spent a year as a deputy county attorney in San Mateo, California. In 1953 she accompanied her husband, a member of the U.S. Army's Judge Advocate General's Corps, to West Germany. During the three years the couple spent in Germany, O'Connor worked as a civilian attorney for the Quartermaster Corps.

On their return from Germany in 1957, O'Connor and her husband settled in Phoenix, where she entered private practice. She soon became active in state and local government, serving as a member of the Maricopa County Board of Adjustments and Appeals (1960-1963) and the Governor's Committee on Marriage and the Family (1965). From 1965 to 1969 she served as assistant attorney general for Arizona.

In 1969 O'Connor was appointed to fill a vacancy in the Arizona Senate. She won election to a full term in 1970 and was reelected in 1972. After her reelection her colleagues elected her majority leader, making her the first woman in the country to hold such a position.

During her years in the Arizona Senate, O'Connor voted in favor of the Equal Rights Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and supported the restoration of the death penalty and limitations on government spending. She also played an active role in Republican Party politics, serving as state cochair of the committee supporting the reelection of President Richard M. Nixon in 1972.

O'Connor's career shifted in 1974 with her election to the Maricopa County Superior Court. She became a respected trial judge and was appointed by Democratic Governor Bruce Babbitt to the Arizona Court of Appeals in 1979. In 1981 President Ronald Reagan appointed her to the U.S. Supreme Court, replacing Justice Potter Stewart.

Her decisions on the Court have revealed her to be a pragmatic conservative. She has written many concurring opinions that attempt to limit the majority's holding, suggesting ways that the Court could have decided an issue on narrower grounds. She has joined her conservative brethren in limiting the rights of defendants in criminal procedure cases and restricting federal intervention into areas reserved to the states. She has been an influential voice in reviewing challenges to affirmative action programs. In her majority opinion in City of Richmond v. J.A. Croson Co., 488 U.S. 469, 109 S. Ct. 706, 102 L. Ed. 2d 854 (1989), O'Connor struck down a set-aside program for minority contractors. She concluded that these types of affirmative action programs can only be justified to remedy prior government discrimination instead of past societal discrimination.

Her position on abortion has been consistent. O'Connor has refused to join some of her conservative colleagues in overruling Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113, 93 S. Ct. 705, 35 L. Ed. 2d 147, the 1973 decision that defined the right to choose abortion as a fundamental constitutional right. In Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey, 505 U.S. 833, 112 S. Ct. 2791, 120 L. Ed. 2d 674 (1992), she joined Justices Anthony McLeod Kennedy and David H. Souter in an opinion that defended the reasoning of Roe and the line of cases that followed it. She has supported the rights of states to regulate abortion as long as the regulations are not too burdensome.

Quotes:

"The family unit plays a critical role in our society and in the training of the generation to come."

Sandra Day O'Connor
Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States
In office September 25, 1981 – January 31, 2006
Nominated by	Ronald Reagan
Preceded by	Potter Stewart
Succeeded by	Samuel Alito
Arizona State Senate Majority Leader Arizona State Senate Republican Leader
In office 1973 – 1975
Arizona State Senator
In office 1969 – 1975
Born	March 26, 1930 (1930-03-26) (age 79) El Paso, Texas, United States
Political party	Republican
Spouse(s)	John Jay O'Connor, III (1952-2009; his death)
Alma mater	Stanford University
Religion	Episcopalian

Sandra Day O'Connor (born March 26, 1930) is an American jurist and was the first female member of the Supreme Court of the United States. She served as an Associate Justice from 1981 until her retirement from the Court in 2006. O'Connor was appointed by Republican President Ronald Reagan in 1981.^[1]

Prior to O'Connor's appointment to the Court, she was an elected official and judge in Arizona.^[2] On July 1, 2005, she announced her intention to retire effective upon the confirmation of a successor.^[3] President George W. Bush nominated Justice Samuel Alito to take her seat in October 2005 and he joined the Court on January 31, 2006.

O'Connor is Chancellor of The College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia, and serves on the board of trustees of the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

In 2001, the Ladies' Home Journal ranked her as the second-most-powerful woman in America.^[4] In 2004 and 2005, Forbes magazine listed her as the sixth- and thirty-sixth-most-powerful woman in the world, respectively; the only American women preceding her on the 2004 list were then-National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice, then-U.S. Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, and then-First Lady Laura Bush.^[5] On August 12, 2009, she was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian honor of the United States, by President Barack Obama.

Contents 1 Early life and education 2 Legal and political career 3 Supreme Court career 3.1 Appointment 3.1.1 Response to being first woman on the Supreme Court 3.2 Supreme Court jurisprudence 3.2.1 Voting record and deciding votes 3.2.2 Cases involving minorities 3.2.3 Abortion 3.2.4 Foreign law 3.3 Conservative criticism 3.4 Christian heritage 3.5 Retirement 4 Post-Supreme Court career 4.1 Commentary 4.2 Activities and memberships 5 Legacy, awards 6 References 7 Notes 8 External links

Early life and education

She was born in El Paso, Texas, to Harry Alfred Day, a rancher, and Ada Mae Wilkey.^[6] She grew up on a cattle ranch near Duncan, Arizona. She later wrote a book with her brother, H. Alan Day, Lazy B : Growing up on a Cattle Ranch in the American Southwest, about her childhood experiences on the ranch. For most of her early schooling, O'Connor lived in El Paso with her maternal grandmother, and attended public schools and the Radford School for Girls, a private school. She is a sister of Alpha Delta Pi sorority. She attended Stanford University, where she received her bachelor of arts degree in economics in 1950. She continued at the Stanford Law School for her bachelor of laws, serving on the Stanford Law Review. Future Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist was the valedictorian. ^[7]

On December 20, 1952, she married John Jay O'Connor (John J. O'Connor III) and they have three sons: Scott, Brian, and Jay. Her husband suffered from Alzheimer's disease for nearly twenty years prior to his death^[8] and she has become involved in creating more awareness about the disease. In November 2007, CNN reported that her family's situation had been made more difficult since, because of memory loss, her husband formed new personal attachments in the institution where he lived while not fully recalling his life-long family connections. ^[9] On Tuesday, November 14, 2007, The New York Times reported in an article Seized by Alzheimer's, Then Love,^[10] that her family was relieved to see her husband of 55 years so content. John O'Connor died on November 11, 2009, aged 79.^[11]

Legal and political career

In spite of her accomplishments at law school, no law firm in California was willing to hire her as a lawyer due to her sex, although one firm did offer her a position as a legal secretary.^{[citation needed]} She therefore turned to public service, taking a position as Deputy County Attorney of San Mateo County, California from 1952—1953 and as a civilian attorney for Quartermaster Market Center in Frankfurt am Main, Germany, from 1954—1957. From 1958—1960, she practiced law in the Maryvale neighborhood of Phoenix, Arizona, and served as Assistant Attorney General of Arizona from 1965—1969.

In 1969 she was appointed to the Arizona State Senate by Republican Arizona Governor Jack Richard Williams and was subsequently re-elected as a Republican to two two-year terms. In 1973, she was elected majority leader.

In 1975, she was elected judge of the Maricopa County Superior Court (Arizona) and served until 1979, when she was appointed to the Arizona Court of Appeals by Democratic Arizona Governor Bruce Babbitt. During her time in the Arizona state government, she served in all three of its branches.

Supreme Court career

Appointment

Supreme Court Justice-nominee Sandra Day O'Connor talks with President Ronald Reagan outside the White House, July 15, 1981.

On July 7, 1981, Reagan — who had pledged during his 1980 presidential campaign to appoint the first woman to the Court^[12] — nominated O'Connor as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, to replace the retiring Potter Stewart.

Anti-abortion and religious groups opposed O'Connor's nomination because they suspected she would not be willing to overturn Roe v Wade.^[13] U.S. Senate Republicans, including Don Nickles of Oklahoma, Steve Symms of Idaho, and Jesse Helms of North Carolina called into the White House to express their discontent over the nomination; Nickles said he and "other profamily Republican senators would not support" O'Connor.^[13] For her part, O'Connor refused to telegraph her views on abortion, and she was careful not to leave the impression that she supported abortion rights.^[14] O'Connor told Reagan she did not remember whether she had voted to repeal Arizona's law banning abortion.^[15] However, she had cast a preliminary vote in the Arizona State Senate in 1970 in favor of a bill to repeal the state's criminal-abortion statute.^[16] In 1974, O'Connor had voted against a measure to prohibit abortions in some Arizona hospitals.^[16]

Reagan wrote in his diary on July 6, 1981: "Called Judge O'Connor and told her she was my nominee for supreme court. Already the flak is starting and from my own supporters. Right to Life people say she is pro abortion. She says abortion is personally repugnant to her. I think she'll make a good justice."^[17] O'Connor was confirmed by the U.S. Senate with a vote of 99–0. In her first year on the Court she received over 60,000 letters from the public, more than any other justice in history.

Response to being first woman on the Supreme Court

In response to an editorial in The New York Times which mentioned the "nine old men" of the Court, the self-styled FWOTSC (First Woman On The Supreme Court) sent a pithy letter to the editor:

“	I noticed the following ....: Is no Washington name exempt from shorthand? One, maybe. The Chief Magistrate responsible for executing the laws is sometimes called the POTUS [President Of The United States]. The nine men who interpret them are often the SCOTUS [Supreme Court Of The United States]. The people who enact them are still, for better or worse, Congress. According to the information available to me, and which I had assumed was generally available, for over two years now SCOTUS has not consisted of nine men. If you have any contradictory information, I would be grateful if you would forward it as I am sure the POTUS, the SCOTUS and the undersigned (the FWOTSC) would be most interested in seeing it.	”
—Sandra D. O'Connor, Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, October 12, 1983, "High Court's '9 Men' Were a Surprise to One", The New York Times, October 5, 1983 re: (First Woman On The Supreme Court); William Safire, "On Language; Potus and Flotus", The New York Times, October 12, 1997. Retrieved December 7, 2007

In several speeches broadcast nationally on the cable network C-SPAN, she mentioned feeling some relief from the media clamor when Ruth Bader Ginsburg joined her as an Associate Justice of the Court in 1993.^{[citation needed]}

Supreme Court jurisprudence

Voting record and deciding votes

Justice O'Connor presents Alberto Gonzales to the audience after swearing him in as U.S. Attorney General, as Mrs. Becky Gonzales looks on.

O'Connor was part of the federalism movement and approached each case as narrowly as possible, avoiding generalizations that might later "paint her into a corner" for future cases. Initially, she seemed as conservative as Rehnquist (voting with him 87% of the time her first three years at the Court).^[18] From that time until 1998, though, O'Connor's alignment with Rehnquist ranged from 93.4% to 63.2%, hitting above 90% in three of those years.^[19] In nine of her first sixteen years on the Court, O'Connor voted with Rehnquist more than with any other justice.^[19]

Later on, as the Court's make-up became more conservative (i.e., Anthony Kennedy replacing Lewis Powell, and Clarence Thomas replacing Thurgood Marshall), O'Connor often became the swing vote on the Court. However, she usually disappointed the Court's more liberal bloc in contentious 5-4 decisions: from 1994 to 2004, she joined the traditional conservative bloc of Rehnquist, Antonin Scalia, Anthony Kennedy, and Thomas 82 times; she joined the liberal bloc of John Paul Stevens, David Souter, Ginsburg, and Stephen Breyer only 28 times.^[20]

O'Connor's (relatively small)^[21] shift away from conservatives on the Court seems to have been due at least in part to Thomas's views.^[22] When Thomas and O'Connor were voting on the same side, she would typically write a separate opinion of her own, refusing to join his.^[23] In the 1992 term, O'Connor did not join a single one of Thomas' dissents.^[24]

Willamette University College of Law Professor Steven Green, who served for nine years as general counsel for Americans United for Separation of Church and State and has argued before the Court numerous times stated, "She was a moderating voice on the court and was very hesitant to expand the law in either direction." Green also noted that, unlike some other Court justices, O'Connor "[s]eemed to look at each case with an open mind".^[25]

Some of the cases in which O'Connor was the deciding vote include:

McConnell v. FEC, 540 U.S. 93 (2003)

This ruling upheld the constitutionality of most of the McCain-Feingold campaign-finance bill regulating "soft money" contributions.

Grutter v. Bollinger, 539 U.S. 306 (2003) and Gratz v. Bollinger, 539 U.S. 244 (2003)

O'Connor wrote the opinion of the court in Grutter and joined the majority in Gratz. In this pair of cases, the University of Michigan's undergraduate admissions program was held to have engaged in unconstitutional reverse discrimination, but the more-limited type of affirmative action in the University of Michigan Law School's admissions program was held to have been constitutional.

Zelman v. Simmons-Harris, 536 U.S. 639 (2002)

O'Connor joined the majority holding that the use of school vouchers for religious schools did not violate the First Amendment's Establishment Clause.

Boy Scouts of America v. Dale, 530 U.S. 640 (2000)

O'Connor joined the majority in holding that New Jersey violated the Boy Scouts' freedom of association by prohibiting it from discriminating against its troop leaders on the basis of sexual orientation.

United States v. Lopez, 514 U.S. 549 (1995)

O'Connor joined a majority holding unconstitutional Gun-Free School Zones Act as beyond Congress's Commerce Clause power.

Bush v. Gore, 531 U.S. 98 (2000)

O'Connor joined with four other justices on December 12, 2000, to rule on the Bush v. Gore case that ceased challenges to the results of the 2000 presidential election (ruling to stop the ongoing Florida election recount and to allow no further recounts). This case effectively ended Gore's hopes to become president. Some legal scholars have argued that she should have recused herself from this case, citing several reports that she became upset when the media initially announced that Gore had won Florida, with her husband explaining that they would have to wait another four years before retiring to Arizona.^[26]

O'Connor played an important role in other notable cases, such as:

Webster v. Reproductive Health Services, 492 U.S. 490 (1989)

This decision upheld as constitutional state restrictions on second trimester abortions that are not necessary to protect maternal health, contrary to the original trimester requirements in Roe v. Wade. Although O'Connor joined the majority, which also included Rehnquist, Scalia, Kennedy and Byron White, in a concurring opinion she refused to explicitly overturn Roe.

Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558 (2003)

O'Connor wrote a concurring opinion contending that state laws that prohibited homosexual sodomy, but not heterosexual sodomy, violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Although she agreed with the majority in holding such laws unconstitutional, she did not join in the opinion that they violated the substantive due process afforded by the Due Process Clause. Under a ruling under the Equal Protection Clause, states could still prohibit sodomy, provided they prohibited both homosexual sodomy and heterosexual sodomy. On February 22, 2005, with Rehnquist and Stevens (who was senior to her) absent, she presided over oral arguments in the case of Kelo v. City of New London, becoming the first woman to preside over an oral argument before the Court.^{[citation needed]}

Cases involving minorities

From her start on the Court until 1998, O'Connor voted against the minority litigant in all but two of the forty-one close cases involving race.^[27]

In the 1990 and 1995 Missouri v. Jenkins rulings, O'Connor voted with the majority that district courts had no authority to require the state of Missouri to increase school funding in order to counteract racial inequality. In the 1991 Freeman v. Pitts case, O'Connor joined a concurring opinion in a plurality, agreeing that a school district that had formerly been under judicial review for racial segregation could be freed of this review, even though not all desegregation targets had been met. Law professor Herman Schwartz criticized these rulings, writing that in both cases "both the fact and effects of segregation were still present."^[27]

In 1987's McCleskey v. Kemp, O'Connor joined a 5–4 majority that voted to uphold the death penalty for an African American man, Warren McCleskey, convicted of killing a white police officer, despite statistical evidence that black defendants were more likely to receive the death penalty than others both in Georgia and in the U.S. as a whole.^[27][28][29]

In 1996's Shaw v. Hunt and Shaw v. Reno, O'Connor joined a Rehnquist opinion, following an earlier path-breaking decision she authored in 1993, in which the court struck down an electoral districting plan designed to facilitate the election of two black representatives out of twelve from North Carolina, a state that had not had any black representative since Reconstruction, despite being approximately 20% black^[27]-- the Court held that the districts were unacceptably gerrymandered and O'Connor called the odd shape of the district in question, North Carolina's 12th, "bizarre".

Law Professor Herman Schwartz called O'Connor "the Court’s leader in its assault on racially oriented affirmative action,"^[27] although she joined with the Court in upholding the constitutionality of race-based admissions to universities.^[12]

In late 2008, O'Connor said she believed affirmative action should continue.^[30]

Abortion

In her confirmation hearings and early days on the court, O'Connor was carefully ambiguous on the issue of abortion, as some conservatives questioned her anti-abortion credentials on the basis of some of her votes in the Arizona legislature.^[13] O'Connor generally dissented from 1980s opinions which took an expansive view of Roe v. Wade; she criticized that decision's "trimester approach" sharply in her dissent in 1983's City of Akron v. Akron Center for Reproductive Health. She criticized Roe in Thornburgh v. American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists: "... I dispute not only the wisdom but also the legitimacy of the Court's attempt to discredit and pre-empt state abortion regulation regardless of the interests it serves and the impact it has."^[31] In 1989, O'Connor stated during the deliberations over the Webster case that she would not overrule Roe.^[32] While on the Court, O'Connor did not vote to strike down any restrictions on abortion until Hodgson v. Minnesota in 1990.

O'Connor allowed certain limits to be placed on access to abortion, but supported the fundamental right to abortion protected by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. For example, in Planned Parenthood v. Casey, O'Connor used a test she had originally developed in City of Akron v. Akron Center for Reproductive Health to limit the holding of Roe v. Wade, opening up a legislative portal where a State could enact measures so long as they did not place an "undue burden" on a woman's right to an abortion. While perhaps limiting the scope of its protections, Casey upheld Roe, preserving as good law Roe's core constitutional precept: that the Fourteenth Amendment protects the fundamental right to control one's reproductive destiny, and hence the essential character and very purpose of one's life. Writing the plurality opinion for the Court, O'Connor famously declared: “At the heart of liberty is the right to define one’s own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life. Beliefs about these matters could not define the attributes of personhood were they formed under compulsion of the State.” Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey, 505 U.S. 833, 851 (1992).

Foreign law

O'Connor was a vigorous defender of the citing of foreign laws in judicial decisions. In a well-publicized October 28, 2003, speech at the Southern Center for International Studies, O'Connor said:

The impressions we create in this world are important and can leave their mark ... [T]here is talk today about the "internationalization of legal relations". We are already seeing this in American courts, and should see it increasingly in the future. This does not mean, of course, that our courts can or should abandon their character as domestic institutions. But conclusions reached by other countries and by the international community, although not formally binding upon our decisions, should at times constitute persuasive authority in American courts—what is sometimes called "transjudicialism".^[33]

In the speech she noted the 2003 Court case, Atkins v. Virginia, in which the majority decision (which included her) cited disapproval of the death penalty in Europe as part of its argument. This speech, and the general concept of relying on foreign law and opinion, was widely criticized by conservatives.^[34] In May 2004, the U.S. House of Representatives responded by passing a non-binding resolution, the "Reaffirmation of American Independence Resolution", stating that "U.S. judicial decisions should not be based on any foreign laws, court decisions, or pronouncements of foreign governments unless they are relevant to determining the meaning of American constitutional and statutory law."^[35]

O'Connor once quoted the constitution of the Middle Eastern nation of Bahrain, which states that "[n]o authority shall prevail over the judgement of a judge, and under no circumstances may the course of justice be interfered with." Further, "It is in everyone's interest to foster the rule-of-law evolution." O'Connor proposed that such ideas be taught in American law schools, high schools and universities. Critics contend that such thinking is contrary to the U.S. Constitution and establishes a rule of man, rather than law.^[33] In her retirement, she has continued to speak and organize conferences on the issue of judicial independence.

Conservative criticism

O'Connor's case-by-case approach routinely placed her in the center of the court and drew both criticism and praise. The Washington Post columnist Charles Krauthammer, for instance, described her as lacking a judicial philosophy and instead displaying "political positioning embedded in a social agenda".^[36] Another conservative commentator, Ramesh Ponnuru, wrote that, although O'Connor "has voted reasonably well" from a conservative standpoint, her tendency to issue very case-specific rulings "[u]ndermines the predictability of the law and aggrandizes the judicial role".^[37]

Christian heritage

In 1989, a letter O'Connor wrote regarding three Court rulings on Christian heritage was used by a group of conservative Arizona Republicans in their claim that America was a "Christian nation". O'Connor, an Episcopalian, said, "It was not my intention to express a personal view on the subject of the inquiry."^[38]

Retirement

O'Connor was successfully treated for breast cancer in 1988 (she also had her appendix removed that year). One side effect of this experience was that there was perennial speculation over the next seventeen years that she might retire from the Court.

On December 12, 2000, The Wall Street Journal reported that O'Connor was reluctant to retire with a Democrat in the presidency:

“

At an Election Night party at the Washington, D.C. home of Mary Ann Stoessel, widow of former Ambassador Walter Stoessel, the justice's husband, John O'Connor, mentioned to others her desire to step down, according to three witnesses. But Mr. O'Connor said his wife would be reluctant to retire if a Democrat were in the White House and would choose her replacement. Justice O'Connor declined to comment.[39][40]

”

Retiring Associate Justice O'Connor and her husband John O'Connor take a photo with President George W. Bush after submitting her resignation letter.

Justice O'Connor's letter to Bush, dated July 1, 2005, announcing her retirement

By 2005, the membership of the Court had been static for eleven years, the second-longest period without a change in the Court's composition in American history. Rehnquist was widely expected to be the first justice to retire during Bush's term, because of his age and his battle with cancer. However, on July 1, 2005, it was O'Connor who announced her retirement plans. In her letter to Bush she stated that her retirement from active service would take effect upon the confirmation of her successor.

On July 19, Bush nominated D.C. Circuit Judge John G. Roberts, Jr. to succeed O'Connor, answering months of speculation as to Bush Supreme Court candidates. O'Connor heard the news over the car radio on the way back from a fishing trip. She felt he was an excellent and highly qualified choice— he had argued numerous cases before the Court during her tenure—but was somewhat disappointed her replacement was not a woman.

On July 21, O'Connor spoke to a 9th U.S. Circuit conference and blamed the televising of Senate Judiciary Committee hearings for escalated conflicts over judges. She expressed sadness over attacks on the independent judiciary, and praised President Reagan for opening doors for women.^{[citation needed]} O'Connor had been expected to leave the Court before the next term started on October 3, 2005. However, Rehnquist died on September 3 (she spoke at his funeral). Two days later, Bush withdrew Roberts as his nominee for her seat and instead appointed him to fill the vacant office of Chief Justice. O'Connor agreed to stay on the Court until her replacement was confirmed. On October 3, Bush nominated White House Counsel Harriet Miers to replace O'Connor. On October 27, Miers asked Bush to withdraw her nomination; Bush accepted her request later the same day. On October 31, Bush nominated Third Circuit Judge Samuel Alito to replace O'Connor; Alito was confirmed and sworn in on January 31, 2006.

O'Connor's last Court opinion, Ayotte v. Planned Parenthood of New England, written for a unanimous court, was a procedural decision that involved abortion.

She stated that she plans to travel, spend time with family, and, because of her fear of the attacks on judges by legislators, will work with the American Bar Association on a commission to help explain the separation of powers and the role of judges. She has also announced that she is working on a new book, which will focus on the early history of the Court. She is currently a trustee on the board of the Rockefeller Foundation. She would have preferred to stay on the Court for several more years until she was ill and "really in bad shape" but stepped down to spend more time with her husband, who had been diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease previous to his death in 2009. O'Connor said it was her plan to follow the tradition of previous justices, who enjoy lifetime appointments. "Most of them get ill and are really in bad shape, which I would've done at the end of the day myself, I suppose, except my husband was ill and I needed to take action there."^[41]

As of August 2009, she continues to hear cases and has rendered over a dozen opinions in federal appellate courts across the country, filling in as a substitute judge when vacations or vacancies leave their three-member panels understaffed.^[42]

Post-Supreme Court career

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Commentary

On March 9, 2006, during a speech at Georgetown University, O'Connor said some political attacks on the independence of the courts pose a direct threat to the constitutional freedoms of Americans. She said any reform of system is debatable as long as it is not motivated by "nakedly partisan reasoning" retaliation because congressmen or senators dislike the result of the cases. Courts interpret the law as it was written, not as the congressmen might have wished it was written, and "it takes a lot of degeneration before a country falls into dictatorship, but we should avoid these ends by avoiding these beginnings."^{[citation needed]} On September 19, 2006, she echoed her concerns for an independent judiciary during the dedication address at the Elon University School of Law.

On September 27, 2006, O'Connor published an op-ed essay in The Wall Street Journal "The Threat to Judicial Independence", in which she decried recent efforts to curtail the independence of the judiciary (such as South Dakota's J.A.I.L. 4 Judges initiative and the attempts by some members of the U.S. Congress to strip the federal judiciary of its jurisdictional ability to hear certain Constitutional claims). The next day, O'Connor co-hosted and spoke at a conference at Georgetown University Law Center, Fair and Independent Courts: A Conference on the State of the Judiciary.^[43]

Judge William H. Pryor, Jr., a conservative jurist, has criticized O'Connor's speeches and op-eds for hyperbole and factual inaccuracy, based in part on O'Connor's opinions as to whether judges face a rougher time in the public eye today than in the past.^[44][45]

On November 7, 2007, at a conference on her landmark opinion in Strickland v. Washington (1984) sponsored by the Constitution Project, O'Connor urged the creation of a system for "merit selection for judges". She also highlighted the lack of proper legal representation for many of the poorest defendants.^[46]

On August 7, 2008, O'Connor and Abdurrahman Wahid, the former President of Indonesia, wrote an editorial in the Financial Times stating their concerns about the threatened imprisonment of Malaysian opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim.^[47]

On November 19, 2008, O'Connor published an introductory essay to a themed issue on judicial accountability in the Denver University Law Review. She calls for a better public understanding of judicial accountability.^[48]

Activities and memberships

As a Retired Supreme Court Justice (roughly equivalent to senior status for judges of lower federal courts), O'Connor is entitled to receive a full salary, maintain a staffed office with at least one law clerk, and to hear cases on a part-time basis in federal district courts and courts of appeals as a visiting judge. In 2003, she wrote a book titled The Majesty of the Law: Reflections of a Supreme Court Justice (ISBN 0-375-50925-9).

On October 4, 2005, President Gene Nichol of the College of William & Mary announced that O'Connor had accepted ^[49] the largely ceremonial role of becoming the 23rd Chancellor of the College, replacing Henry Kissinger, and following in the position held by Margaret Thatcher, Chief Justice Warren Burger, and President George Washington. The Investiture Ceremony was held April 7, 2006. O'Connor continues to make semi-regular visits to the college.

In 2005, she wrote a children's book, Chico (ISBN 0-525-47452-8), which gives an autobiographical description of her childhood.

O'Connor was a member of the 2006 Iraq Study Group, appointed by the U.S. Congress.^[50]

On May 15, 2006, O'Connor gave the commencement address at the William & Mary School of Law, where she said that judicial independence is "under serious attack at both the state and national level".^[51]

As of Spring 2006, O'Connor teaches a two-week course called "The Supreme Court" at the University of Arizona's James E. Rogers College of Law every spring semester.

In October 2006, O'Connor sat as a member of panels of the United States Courts of Appeals for the Second, Eighth, and Ninth Circuits, to hear arguments in one-day's cases in each court.^[52]

O'Connor chaired the Jamestown 2007 celebration at Jamestown, Virginia, commemorating the 400th anniversary of the founding of the Jamestown Settlement in 1607. Her appearances in Jamestown dovetailed with her appearances and speeches as chancellor at The College of William & Mary nearby. In the fall of 2007, O'Connor and W. Scott Bales taught a course at the Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law at Arizona State University.

In 2008, O'Connor was named an inaugural Harry Rathbun Visiting Fellow by the Office for Religious Life at Stanford University. On April 22, 2008, she gave "Harry's Last Lecture On A Meaningful Life" in honor of the former Stanford Law professor who shaped her undergraduate and law careers.^[53]

In February 2009, O'Connor launched OurCourts.org, a website she created to offer interactive civics lessons to students and teachers because she was concerned about the lack of knowledge among most young Americans about how their government works.^[54] On March 3, 2009, O'Connor appeared on the satirical television program The Daily Show with Jon Stewart to promote the website. In August 2009, OurCourts.org added two online interactive games.^[55]

Legacy, awards

• The federal courthouse in Phoenix, dedicated in 2000, is named in her honor.^[56]
• In 1985, She received the Elizabeth Blackwell Award, an award presented periodically to a woman who has demonstrated "outstanding service to humankind", from Hobart and William Smith Colleges.
• In 2002, O'Connor was inducted into the National Cowgirl Hall of Fame in Fort Worth.^[57]
• On July 4, 2003, the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia awarded O'Connor the Liberty Medal. In her acceptance speech she stated, "One of our greatest judges, Learned Hand, explained:

  'Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women. When it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can save it.' But our understanding today must go beyond the recognition that ‘liberty lies in (our) hearts’ to the further recognition that only citizens with knowledge about the content and meaning of our constitutional guarantees of liberty are likely to cherish those concepts."^[58]

• On September 8, 2004, Redwood City, California dedicated the courtroom of its renovated historical courthouse (now a museum) to O'Connor.^[59]
• For her commitment to the ideals of "Duty, Honor, Country", she was awarded the Sylvanus Thayer Award by the United States Military Academy in 2005, becoming only the third woman to receive the award.
• On January 2, 2006, she served as Grand Marshal at the 117th annual Tournament of Roses Parade in Pasadena, California. She started the 92nd annual Rose Bowl Game with a coin toss on January 4. Coincidentally, the parade was conducted in heavy rain for the first time since 1955, when the Grand Marshal had been then-Chief Justice Earl Warren.
• On April 5, 2006, Arizona State University renamed its law school the Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law.^[60]
• Yale University awarded O'Connor an honorary doctoral degree at its 305th commencement on May 22, 2006.
• On September 19, 2006, she delivered the Dedication Address for the Elon University School of Law in Greensboro, North Carolina and accepted an Honorary Doctor of Laws degree. Earlier that day, she delivered the Fall Convocation Address at Elon University, where she accepted a Doctor of Laws degree.
• On March 26, 2008, O'Connor was given the Harry F. Byrd Jr. '35 Public Service Award from the Virginia Military Institute.
• On September 22, 2008, she received the 2008 Franklin Award for commitment to public service and strengthening civic participation from the National Conference on Citizenship.
• On October 7, 2008, she was inducted into the Texas Women's Hall of Fame in Denton, Texas.
• On April 9, 2009, Sandra Day O'Connor was named Fifteenth Hendrick Fellow by the United States Coast Guard Academy.
• O'Connor was awarded the U.S. Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Barack Obama on August 12, 2009.^[61][62]

References

• Greenburg, Jan Crawford (2007). Supreme Conflict: The Inside Story of the Struggle for Control of the United States Supreme Court. Penguin Books.
• Montini, E.J. (2005) "Rehnquist is No. 1, O'Connor is No. 3, Baloney is No. 2.", The Arizona Republic; accessed August 21, 2009.
• O'Connor, Sandra Day; and Day, H. Alan (2002). Lazy B: Growing Up on a Cattle Ranch in the American Southwest. Random House. ISBN 0-375-50724-8. 

Notes

1. ^ Weisman, Steven R. (July 7, 1981)Reagan Nominating Woman, an Arizona Appeals Judge, to Serve on Supreme Court, The New York Times, Accessed September 10, 2009
2. ^ "O'Connor, Sandra Day". Federal Judicial Center. http://www.fjc.gov/servlet/tGetInfo?jid=1796. Retrieved March 21, 2006. 
3. ^ Stevenson, R.W. (July 1, 2005) O'Connor, First Woman Supreme Court Justice, Resigns After 24 Years, The New York Times, Accessed September 10, 2009
4. ^ McCaslin, John (November 7, 2001). "Power Women". McCaslin's Beltway Beat (Washington, D.C.: Townhall.com). http://www.townhall.com/columnists/JohnMcCaslin/2001/11/07/mccaslins_beltway_beat. Retrieved June 15, 2009. "… Ladies' Home Journal, … ranks the 30 Most Powerful Women based on cultural clout, financial impact, achievement, visibility, influence, intellect, political know-how and staying power. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton ranks 5th on the list behind Miss Winfrey, Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, Martha Stewart and Barbara Walters" 
5. ^ "The World's Most Powerful Women". Forbes. August 20, 2004. http://www.forbes.com/2004/08/18/04powomland.htmll. Retrieved March 4, 2009. 
6. ^ Oyez: Sandra Day O'Connor, U.S. Supreme Court Justice
7. ^ FOXNews.com - Transcript: O'Connor on FOX
8. ^ "Husband of Retired Justice O'Connor Dies". The New York Times. Associated Press. November 11, 2009. http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2009/11/11/us/AP-US-Obit-OConnor-Husband.html. Retrieved November 11, 2009. 
9. ^ CNN Newsroom, Cable News Network, 1:45 PM on November 14, 2007.
10. ^ Parker-Pope, Tara (November 14, 2007). "Seized by Alzheimer’s, Then Love". The New York Times (blog). Accessed August 22, 2009.
11. ^ Death of John O'Connor
12. ^ ^{a b} James Taranto, Leonard Leo (2004). Presidential Leadership. Wall Street Journal Books. http://books.google.com/books?id=zxBAnuWpg5kC. Retrieved October 20, 2008. 
13. ^ ^{a b c} Greenburg, Jan Crawford (2007), p. 222
14. ^ Greenburg, ibid. pp. 222-23
15. ^ Greenburg, ibid. p. 223
16. ^ ^{a b} Greenhouse, Linda. Becoming Justice Blackmun. Times Books (2005); p. 141
17. ^ Transcript (January 30, 2008<?). "Transcript of GOP debate at Reagan Library" CNN Accessed August 27, 2009.
18. ^ Greenburg, ibid., p. 68.
19. ^ ^{a b} Op-ed essay Schwartz, Herman (April 12, 1998). "O'Connor as a 'Centrist'? Not When Minorities Are Involved" Los Angeles Times. Accessed August 28, 2009.
20. ^ [http://www.harvardlawreview.org/issues/118/Nov04/Nine_Justices_Ten_YearsFTX.pdf Harvard Law Review, volume 118, p. 521
21. ^ [1] The Washington Post
22. ^ Greenburg, ibid., pp. 122-23
23. ^ Greenburg, ibid., pp. 123, 134.
24. ^ Greenburg, ibid., p. 123
25. ^ Smythe, Barbara. "Retired But Remembered: Oregon lawyers reminisce about Justice Sandra Day O’Connor". http://www.osbar.org/publications/bulletin/06febmar/oconnor.html. Retrieved April 26, 2007. 
26. ^ Neumann, Richard K., Jr. (2003). "Conflicts of interest in Bush v. Gore: Did some justices vote illegally?". The Georgetown Journal of Legal Ethics. p. 34. http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3975/is_200304/ai_n9221306.  The article cites multiple, uncontested sources on this and related incidents, and argues they were grounds for recusal on three separate bases: personal bias regarding a party to litigation, appearance of partiality, and material interest.
27. ^ ^{a b c d e} O’Connor as a ‘Centrist’? Not When Minorities Are Involved, Herman Schwartz, Los Angeles Times, April 12, 1988.
28. ^ McCleskey v. Kemp, New Georgia Encyclopedia
29. ^ David Baldus, et al., In The Post-Furman Era: An Empirical And Legal Overview, With Recent Findings From Philadelphia, 83 Cornell L. Rev. 1638 (1998)
30. ^ "Justice O'Connor, at Harvard Law School, says that affirmative action should continue"
31. ^ Greenhouse, Linda. Becoming Justice Blackmun. Times Books. 2005. p. 183
32. ^ Greenburg, ibid., p. 80
33. ^ ^{a b} Remarks at the Southern Center for International Studies, Sandra Day O'Connor, October 28, 2003
34. ^ Phyllis Schlafly (May 2005). "Is Relying on Foreign Law Impeachable?". The Phyllis Schlafly Report. http://www.eagleforum.org/psr/2005/may05/psrmay05.html. 
35. ^ "Reaffirmation of American Independence Resolution Approved", May 13, 2004
36. ^ Krauthammer, Charles. "Philosophy for a Judge". The Washington Post. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/07/07/AR2005070701898.html. Retrieved November 18, 2005. 
37. ^ Ponnuru, Ramesh (June 30, 2003). "Sandra's Day". National Review. http://www.nationalreview.com/flashback/ponnuru200507011211.asp. Retrieved March 18, 2007. 
38. ^ "Supreme Court's first woman justice Sandra Day O'Connor announces her retirement". Court TV. July 18, 2005. http://www.courttv.com/scripts/features/fea_printPage.asp?thisFile=/news/2005/0701/oconnor_ap.html. Retrieved June 30, 2008. 
39. ^ "Georgetown Journal of Legal Ethics: "Conflicts of interest in Bush v. Gore: Did some justices vote illegally?"". http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3975/is_200304/ai_n9221306. Retrieved November 18, 2005. 
40. ^ "TIME Pacific: Can the Court Recover?: December 25, 2000: NO. 51". http://www.time.com/time/pacific/magazine/20001225/poy_court.html. Retrieved November 18, 2005. 
41. ^ Staff writer (February 5, 2007). "Former Justice O'Connor:'I Would Have Stayed Longer'". The Associated Press via NewsMax Media. http://newsmax.com/archives/articles/2007/2/5/92619.shtml. Retrieved August 24, 2009. 
42. ^ Bravin, Jess (August 11, 2009). "Change of Venue: In Retirement, Justice O'Connor Still Rules". The Wall Street Journal. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124994271588320565.html#mod=todays_us_page_one. 
43. ^ Georgetown University Law Center. "Fair and Independent Courts: A Conference on the State of the Judiciary". Press release. http://www.law.georgetown.edu/news/events/conference_story.html. Retrieved November 11, 2006. 
44. ^ "'Neither Force Nor Will, But Merely Judgment'", The Wall Street Journal, October 4, 2006
45. ^ "Judge Pryor on Judicial Independence", Harvard Law Record, March 15, 2007.
46. ^ "Justice O'Connor's Wish: a Wand, not a Gavel", U.S. News & World Report, November 7, 2007.
47. ^ "To defend Anwar is to defend Malaysian democracy", Sandra Day O’Connor and Abdurrahman Wahid, Financial Times, August 7, 2008
48. ^ Judicial Accountability Must Safeguard, Not Threaten, Judicial Independence: An Introduction, 86 Denv. U.L. Rev. 1 (2008)
49. ^ "The College of William and Mary announcement of O'Connor's appointment to Chancellor post". http://www.wm.edu/news/index.php?id=5234&readMore=true. Retrieved November 18, 2005. 
50. ^ "Iraq Study Group Members". http://www.usip.org/isg/members.html. Retrieved November 10, 2006. 
51. ^ Whitson, Brian. "Maintain Judicial Independence O'Connor Tells Law Graduates". http://www.wm.edu/law/cnews/show_news.php?subaction=showfull&id=1147725549&archive=&start_from=&ucat=3&. Retrieved September 19, 2007. 
52. ^ Mulcahy, Ned (October 7, 2006). "Paper Chase: O'Connor to hear Second Circuit cases". Jurist. http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/paperchase/2006/10/oconnor-to-hear-second-circuit-cases.php. Retrieved November 11, 2006. 
53. ^ Office for Religious Life at Stanford University
54. ^ News release "Our Courts Launches Civics Website — Ourcourts.org Offers Civics Resources such as Lesson Plans, Educational Videos, and a Blog for Students to Interact with Justice O'Connor", February 25, 2009; OurCourts.org; accessed September 1, 2009
55. ^ Zehr, Mary Ann (August 20, 2009 (updated August 25, 2009)). "Celebrities Lend Weight to Promote Civics Education". Education Week. http://www.edweek.org/login.html?source=http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2009/08/20/01civics.h29.html&destination=http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2009/08/20/01civics.h29.html&levelId=2100. Retrieved September 1, 2009. 
56. ^ Justice O'Connor's remarks on the courthouses' dedication, October 2000.
57. ^ "Cowgirl Hall of Fame". http://www.cowgirl.net/honorees/Sandra_Day_O%E2%80%99Connor.aspx. Retrieved November 18, 2005. 
58. ^ 2003 Recipient Sandra Day O'Connor - Liberty Medal - National Constitution Center
59. ^ Sanda Day O'Connor Courthouse
60. ^ "ASU names College of Law after O'Connor". ASU Insight. April 5, 2006. http://www.asu.edu/news/stories/200604/20060405_oconnor.htm. Retrieved September 19, 2007. 
61. ^ "President Obama Names Medal of Freedom Recipients — 16 Agents of Change to Receive Top Civilian Honor". White House Office of the Press Secretary; accessed September 1, 2009.
62. ^ News release (August 12, 2009). "Medal of Freedom Ceremony". White House Office of the Press Secretary; accessed September 1, 2009.

External links

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Sandra Day O'Connor

Wikinews has related news: United States Supreme Court Justice O'Connor to retire

General biographical information

• Official Supreme Court biographies of all current justices (PDF format)
• The OYEZ Project's biography by a Northwestern University law professor
• http://ourcourts.org/ OurCourts.org, a project supported by the O'Connor to teach children civics

Additional information

• Works related to Works by Sandra Day O'Connor at Wikisource

• Read Congressional Research Service (CRS) Reports regarding Justice O'Connor
• "O'Connor not bothered by delayed retirement.", The Associated Press September 28, 2005.
• "Sandra Day O'Connor prepares for final days on Supreme Court.", The Associated Press September 19, 2005.
• Cases in which O'Connor has been the deciding vote (July 1, 2005)
• Farewell comments from her fellow justices (July 1, 2005)
• Centrist justice sought 'social stability'
• An Interview with Justice Sandra Day O’Connor Third Branch (August 2009)
• Sandra Day O'Connor directory category

Legal offices
Preceded by Potter Stewart	Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States September 25, 1981 – January 31, 2006	Succeeded by Samuel Alito
United States order of precedence
Preceded by Sonia Sotomayor Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States	United States order of precedence Retired Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States	Succeeded by David Souter Retired Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States
Honorary titles
Preceded by Henry Kissinger	Chancellor of The College of William & Mary April 7, 2006 – present	Succeeded by Incumbent

v • d • e Judicial opinions of Sandra Day O'Connor Maricopa County, Arizona Superior Court (1975–1979); Arizona Court of Appeals (1980–1981) 1975–1981 Supreme Court of the United States (September 25, 1981 – January 31, 2006); by term 1981 • 1982 • 1983 • 1984 • 1985 • 1986 • 1987 • 1988 • 1989 • 1990 • 1991 • 1992 • 1993 • 1994 • 1995 • 1996 • 1997 • 1998 • 1999 • 2000 • 2001 • 2002 • 2003 • 2004 • 2005

Supreme Court of the United States

The Burger Court Chief Justice: Warren Earl Burger (1969–1986) 1981–1986: Wm. J. Brennan | B. White | T. Marshall | H. Blackmun | L.F. Powell, Jr. | Wm. Rehnquist | J.P. Stevens | S.D. O'Connor The Rehnquist Court Chief Justice: William Hubbs Rehnquist (1986–2005) 1986–1987: Wm. J. Brennan | B. White | T. Marshall | H. Blackmun | L.F. Powell, Jr. | J.P. Stevens | S.D. O'Connor | A. Scalia 1988–1990: Wm. J. Brennan | B. White | T. Marshall | H. Blackmun | J.P. Stevens | S.D. O'Connor | A. Scalia | A. Kennedy 1990–1991: B. White | T. Marshall | H. Blackmun | J.P. Stevens | S.D. O'Connor | A. Scalia | A. Kennedy | D. Souter 1991–1993: B. White | H. Blackmun | J.P. Stevens | S.D. O'Connor | A. Scalia | A. Kennedy | D. Souter | C. Thomas 1993–1994: H. Blackmun | J.P. Stevens | S.D. O'Connor | A. Scalia | A. Kennedy | D. Souter | C. Thomas | R.B. Ginsburg 1994–2005: J.P. Stevens | S.D. O'Connor | A. Scalia | A. Kennedy | D. Souter | C. Thomas | R.B. Ginsburg | S. Breyer The Roberts Court Chief Justice: John Glover Roberts, Jr. (2005-present) 2005–2006: J.P. Stevens | S.D. O'Connor | A. Scalia | A. Kennedy | D. Souter | C. Thomas | R.B. Ginsburg | S. Breyer

v • d • e Members of the Iraq Study Group Chairs James Baker (Co-chair) • Lee Hamilton (Co-chair) Members Lawrence Eagleburger • Vernon Jordan, Jr. • Edwin Meese • Sandra Day O'Connor • Leon Panetta • William Perry • Chuck Robb • Alan Simpson Former members Robert Gates • Rudy Giuliani

v • d • e The College of William & Mary Williamsburg, Virginia Academics Affiliate institutions: Richard Bland College Schools: Mason School of Business • School of Arts and Sciences • School of Education • School of Law • Virginia Institute of Marine Science Programs: Center for Gifted Education • Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture • Thomas Jefferson Program in Public Policy Other: Awards • Brigham-Kanner Property Rights Conference / Prize • Honor Code • Institute of Bill of Rights Law • Phi Beta Kappa Society • Public Ivy • Southern Ivy • William & Mary Scandal of 1951 Athletics Sports: Football (2009 season / Capital Cup) • Men's Basketball • Women's Soccer Facilities: Albert-Daly Field • Blow Gymnasium • Busch Field • Busch Tennis Courts • Jimmye Laycock Football Center • Kaplan Arena at William & Mary Hall • McCormack-Nagelsen Tennis Center • Plumeri Park • Walter J. Zable Stadium at Cary Field Other: Colonial Athletic Association • Colonel Ebirt • Tribe Fight Song • Tribe Athletics Campus Alan B. Miller Hall • Alumni House • Brafferton • Crim Dell Bridge • Integrated Science Center • Lake Matoaka Amphitheatre • Muscarelle Museum of Art • Phi Beta Kappa Memorial Hall • Sunken Garden • Wren Building Libraries Earl Gregg Swem Library • Henry C. Wolf Law Library • Mason School of Business Library • School of Education Library • William J. Hargis, Jr. Library • William Small Physical Laboratory Library History History • Firsts • Colonial Colleges • Christopher Newport University • Old Dominion University • Priorities of the College Media Publications (DoG Street Journal; Flat Hat; Virginia Informer) • William and Mary Quarterly • WCWM 90.9 FM • WMTV People Alumni  • Presidents • W. Taylor Reveley III (President)  • Sandra Day O'Connor (Chancellor)  • Police  • King William III & Queen Mary II  • Commencement Speakers  • Jon Stewart  • Glenn Close  • Thomas Jefferson  • Mike Tomlin  • John Tyler  • James Monroe  • John Marshall Student Life American Parliamentary Debate Association • Bus Transportation • Greek Life • Our Alma Mater • Queens' Guard • Secret Societies (7 Society; Bishop James Madison Society; Flat Hat Club; Wren Society) • Student Assembly Miscellaneous Ash Lawn-Highland • City of Williamsburg • Colonial Williamsburg • I Am the College • Royal Hospital School • SS William and Mary Victory Founded: 1693   •   Students: 7,892   •   Endowment: $586 million

Persondata
NAME	O'Conner, Sandra Day
ALTERNATIVE NAMES
SHORT DESCRIPTION	U.S. Supreme Court justice
DATE OF BIRTH	March 26, 1930
PLACE OF BIRTH	El Paso, Texas, United States
DATE OF DEATH
PLACE OF DEATH

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