Former United States Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, a steadfast voice of moderate conservatism and the first woman to serve on the nation’s highest court, died Friday. She was 93 years old.
Ms. O’Connor died in Phoenix of complications related to dementia and a respiratory illness, the Supreme Court said in a news release.
The President of the Supreme Court John Roberts said through a statement that “The woman from the southwestern part of America, Sandra Day O’Connor left a historical mark as the first female judge of our country.” “She worked with determination, unquestionable ability and sincere commitment.”
In 2018, she announced that she had been diagnosed with “the early stages of dementia, likely caused by Alzheimer’s disease.” Her husband, John O’Connor, died of the same disease in 2009.
She was the granddaughter of an American who traveled to the western United States from Vermont and built the family farm about three decades before Arizona became a state. Mrs. O’Connor was persistent and had an independent spirit. As a child, growing up in a rural region of the country, she worked with horses, cattle and farm machinery such as tractors and trucks.
“I didn’t do all the things boys did,” she said in an interview with Time magazine in 1981, “but I did repair windmills and fences.”
At the Supreme Court, her influence was pronounced in the court’s rulings on abortion, the most divisive issue the justices faced. Ms. O’Connor refused to allow states to outlaw most abortion laws, refusing in 1989 to join four other justices who were poised to overturn the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that made constitutionally right abortion.
Then, in 1992, she was part of a five-member Supreme Court majority that reaffirmed the 1973 abortion decision. “Some consider abortion an affront to their principles, but that cannot affect our decision,” Ms. O’Connor told the court, reading a summary of the 1992 decision. to all, not to enforce our moral code”.
Thirty years later, the Supreme Court, with a conservative majority, overturned the 1973 decision on abortion. Justice Samuel Alito wrote the majority decision. He replaced Ms O’Connor in 2006 after she retired. President George W. Bush nominated Mr. Alito to the post of a member of the Supreme Court and his candidacy was approved by the Senate.
In 2000, Ms. O’Connor was part of the majority in a vote that ended the disputed 2000 presidential election in favor of Republican candidate George Bush, who was running against his Democratic rival Al Gore.
Ms O’Connor was held in high esteem by many of her colleagues. When she retired, Justice Clarence Thomas, a hard-line conservative, called her “an outstanding colleague, who spoke carefully when voting against the (Supreme Court) majority and did not boast when voting with the majority.”
However, she sometimes expressed her views even more bitingly. One of her last acts as a judge was to vote against the Supreme Court’s decision to allow local governments to seize personal property to allow private companies to build shopping malls, office buildings and other facilities. She warned that most judges ruled unwisely, giving even more power to powerful entities. “The specter of this decision now threatens all properties,” she wrote. “Nothing now prevents the state from replacing every house with a shopping mall, or every farm with a factory.”
Ms. O’Connor, who commentators once called the nation’s most powerful woman, remained the only woman on the U.S. Supreme Court until 1993, when President Bill Clinton nominated Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, something she welcomed. and relief. The court currently has four female judges, the largest number of women members in its history.
The overwhelming response to Ms O’Connor’s appointment had surprised her. She received more than 60,000 letters in her first year as a judge, more than any member in the court’s history. “I had no idea when I was appointed how much my appointment would mean to so many people across the country,” she said. “My appointment touched people in a very personal way. People saw it as a signal that there are unlimited opportunities for women. The appointment was important for the parents of the girls and for the girls themselves.”
At times, the constant publicity was almost unbearable. “I never expected this, nor did I have a great desire to become a member of the Supreme Court,” she said.
After her retirement, Ms. O’Connor expressed regret that she was not replaced by a woman. She remained active in government even after retiring from court. She serves as a judge on several federal appeals courts, advocated for judicial independence, and served on the Iraq Study Group. She was also appointed chancellor emeritus at the College of William and Mary in Virginia.
Mrs. O’Connor cited her husband’s battle with Alzheimer’s disease as the reason for leaving court.
While serving as a member of the Supreme Court, Ms. O’Connor generally favored the states in their disputes with the federal government. She often sided with the police when they faced allegations of human rights violations. In 1985, she wrote the court’s decision that ruled that the confession of a criminal suspect who had first been read his rights could be used as evidence at trial even if the police had violated the suspect’s rights while had been interrogated before.
Ms O’Connor was 51 when she joined the court replacing the retiring Potter Stewart. An unknown on the national stage until her appointment, she had served as an Arizona state judge and before that as a member of her state legislature.
She graduated with honors from Stanford University’s law school in 1952. Ms. O’Connor said most large law firms at the time did not hire women, and she began her career as a secretary.
In late 1988, Mrs. O’Connor was diagnosed with breast cancer and underwent mastectomy. During this time she did not go to work for only two weeks.
Mrs. O’Connor was embarrassed in 1989 after conservative Republicans in Arizona used a letter she had sent to support their claim that the United States is a “Christian country.” The 1988 letter, which prompted some sharp criticism of Ms O’Connor from legal scholars, cited three Supreme Court decisions that discussed the country’s Christian heritage.
She said she regretted using the letter in a political debate. “It was not my intention to express a personal view on this subject,” Ms O’Connor said at the time.