Talk:Sandra Day O'Connor/Archive 1

Resignation
Justice Sandra Day O'Connor has announced her resignation. The announcement came Friday morning, July 1. -- anonymous contribution 1 July 2005 14:48 (UTC)


 * Right during the Price is Right :-( grrr..... -- unsigned contribution by CFIF 1 July 2005 15:26 (UTC)

clarification?
"She later wrote a book about her childhood experiences on the ranch, "Lazy B," with her brother, H. Alan Day." did she write the book with her brother? or did she have the experiences with her brother? Kingturtle 1 July 2005 16:50 (UTC)
 * They are indeed co-authors of the book (and also had shared experiences) NoSeptember T  1 July 2005 18:41 (UTC)

First section POV
In this context, "relatively moderate" could be construed as POV. Relative to what? Also, if this is going to stay, it should also say that she was considered part of the "conservative wing" for quite some time before being the "moderate" on this court.

Perhaps this should be moved to an ideology section or something?

Retirement vs. resignation
Although the words "retirement" and "resignation" are often used interchangably, they are two very different steps for a Supreme Court Justice to take. By announcing her intention to "retire" rather than "resign," Justice O'Connor will be leaving active service and entering senior status. In this capacity, she is a senior member of the court, and entitled to full privileges of federal judgeship. She receives full salary, although this may be reduced if she does not perform any judicial duties. See 28 U.S.C. &sect;&sect; 371, 471.

Please check your verbiage carefully when posting updates on this and other pages. The news media have been totally inconsistent on this point. --Saucy Intruder 2 July 2005 00:27 (UTC)
 * This is particularly important in light of the fact that, as a retired Supreme Court Justice, she can return to the Court to sit as an alternate in cases where another justice recuses himself. She will also be the first living ex-justice in quite some time. -- BD2412 talk July 2, 2005 00:45 (UTC)

Suspicious retirement

 * http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/01/politics/01AP-text.htm
 * July 1, 2005
 * O'Connor's Retirement Letter to President Bush


 * Dear President Bush:


 * This is to inform you of my decision to retire from my position as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States effective upon the nomination and confirmation of my successor. It has been a great privilege, indeed, to have served as a member of the court for 24 terms. I will leave it with enormous respect for the integrity of the court and its role under our constitutional structure.


 * Sincerely,
 * Sandra Day O'Connor

Do I smell something fishy here? One of the most powerful women gives up her power so easily and cheaply while that old and dying Cancer Man still refuses to retire or resign. GWB will have two new chief justices in months. Scalia and Thomas will have two little friends. It'll be the zenith of human civilization. -- Toytoy July 2, 2005 02:00 (UTC)


 * Leaving aside the tastefulness of smelling something fishy<?> when a woman retires, and of mocking Rehnquists's cancer....How do you envisage two chief justices as a result of O'Connor's resignation? She'll be replaced by an associate justice, not a chief justice. There can be no nomination for Rehnquists's position until he decides to leave it, or dies in office. - Nunh-huh 2 July 2005 02:06 (UTC)

A few points here, Toytoy:


 * John Paul Stevens is four years older than Rehnquist and is also decrepit with age (although he is not fighting off cancer). Why aren't you making scurrilous remarks about his hold on his seat?
 * In all seriousness, O'Connor has been tired of her job for a while now, and has grandkids waiting for her in Arizona. Meanwhile, Rehnquist's wife died a few years back and he doesn't seem to have much of a life waiting for him outside the Court.  Add in the fact that the Justices probably don't want to create double vacancies if they don't have to, and it makes perfect sense that O'Connor would resign first.

&mdash; DLJessup 2 July 2005 04:35 (UTC)

someone
Has changed her name to "O'Queef". And I can't edit it...so could someone else?

Image:SandraDayOConnor.jpg
where is it from? it´s written ''"This is the official portrait of Justice Sandra Day O'Connor."' .. but the source is not given :o( ... so it might be PD .. but ... Sicherlich talk 2 July 2005 13:21 (UTC)
 * I'm fairly sure they are from the Supreme Court, but any image of the justices seems to be hard to come by for some reason. -- tomf688 (talk) July 2, 2005 15:50 (UTC)

Full title
As a justice, O'Connor's full title should be "The honorable Sandra Day O'Connor. The pages for justices from other countries always begin with "The honorable" and I don't see why the pages for American judges should be any different. user:J.J.


 * Let me give you a few comments:
 * * First of all, justices and judges from a British tradition often have "the Right Honourable" or something similar prefixed before their names. That's because that is the tradition in those countries.  Americans threw out most of those traditions during the American Revolution, so it isn't necessarily appropriate for us.
 * * On a more practical level, I don't believe that any other justice, past or present, has "The honorable" prefixed to their name, and I don't propose that we go through all the articles and change them.
 * Thus, I will be reverting that change.
 * &mdash; DLJessup 3 July 2005 03:55 (UTC)

According to most protocol guides, like this one it's still considered proper form for a justice to be referred to as "the Honorable" as part of her full title. Wikipedia articles always begin with the person's most full, proper title, and in this case that should include the honorable. You're right that grander titles such as Excellency and so forth have been phased out in the US, but honorable has stayed. In court, they even introduce judges by stating "the Honorable So-and-So presiding," and of course everyone present refers to him or her as "your honor." user:J.J.


 * While "The Honorable" would technically be a correct title, seems to me it would be redundant with "Justice". -- BD2412 talk July 4, 2005 00:16 (UTC)

There is not even the title "Justice" as of now. user:J.J.


 * J.J., could you please point out in the Wikipedia project pages where it says that "Wikipedia articles always begin with the person's most full, proper title"? I ask because I've just scanned many of the bios of Supreme Court justices and of Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, and George W. Bush.  The closest that any of these articles has gotten to your rule is that current justices (and only the current ones), aside from O'Connor herself, start off with "Justice".  (That exception turns out to be because Whig added that to the articles back in May of this year, and the introductory sentences end up reading as "Justice X has been an Associate Justice", which is just a little bit redundant.)  No previous justice gets a title so far as I can tell, nor does any President, including the current one.  If what you write is truly a Wikipedia standard, we're going to have to modify a lot of articles.  &mdash; DLJessup 4 July 2005 23:03 (UTC)

Forbes
Why is the forbes ranking mentioned in the head of the article? its just an personal opinion of the people from forbes and thus should be removed.


 * The point is that O'Connor is one of the most powerful women in the country, if not the world (at least until her retirement goes through), and the Forbes article is the closest to an objective, citable source that any article editor has come up with. If you've got a better source in support of this proposition, or a good counterexample, by all means add it to the article.


 * &mdash; DLJessup 3 July 2005 14:24 (UTC)

Missing material?
There has been talk / speculation about who the successor will be to Sandra Day O'Connor. It seems that this could be created under its own article with a blurb in this article? There may not be enough material yet to start it but what should it be called to prepare, Nomination confirmation to the Supreme Court of the United States (2005) ? --ShaunMacPherson 4 July 2005 11:18 (UTC)
 * Information about the nomination and confirmation process will likely go to the article on the nominee, when one is named. -- BD2412 talk July 4, 2005 21:20 (UTC)
 * Also information is going into this article: Potential Bush administration nominees to the Supreme Court of the United States, but once a nomination is made, the focus of discussion will be in the nominee's biography article. NoSeptember T  5 July 2005 21:33 (UTC)

Recent vandalism - lock?
This article seems to be a heavy target for vandalism in the last couple days. Perhaps a lock would be in order for a while until the children go away? Autiger 6 July 2005 04:45 (UTC)
 * I'd second that idea... --WAHooker July 6, 2005 13:06 (UTC)
 * I dissent; the vandalism is not as bad as some other pages that remain unprotected (see, e.g., George W. Bush, which gets vandalized over 50 times per day. --Saucy Intruder 6 July 2005 13:21 (UTC)
 * I see no harm to it, as no new work on this article will be necessary until the nominee is named. In the meantime, it seems that all the edits are vandalism, revert, vandalism, revert... -- BD2412 talk July 6, 2005 13:24 (UTC)
 * If we lock this one, then why not lock the new nominee's page and every current event article that sees extra traffic and vandalism? No, we should save the lock for the rare cases of the persistent vandal who is not stopped by blocking.  NoSeptember T  6 July 2005 16:03 (UTC)

Gonzales photo
Is that photo based on the assumption that Gonzales will replace O'Connor? If that turns out to not be the case, the photo will be somewhat irrelevant. Will the photo then be taken down? --JamesB3 03:12, 13 July 2005 (UTC)
 * As long as he is Attorney General, the photo seems to be appropriate (the highest level person sworn in by her, except for any inaugurals she may have done). That he is a possible nominee makes it more so.  I like it, we should keep it.  NoSeptember -  03:34, 13 July 2005 (UTC)
 * SDO swore in Dan Quayle in '89, I believe, so Gonzales is not the highest-ranking swearing in she has performed. --Saucy Intruder 18:54, 13 July 2005 (UTC)
 * As noted above, I thought she may have done an inaugural or two. Gonzales' swearing in is certainly a more recent event involving a still active official, so it still seems appropriate to keep picture.  NoSeptember -  20:57, 13 July 2005 (UTC)

O'Connor dating Rehnquist
I find that to be supisious, does anyone have any way to verify that fact?


 * This has been known for years. I saw her give a speech at the University of Kansas in 1986 and she made a joke about it.  ---  --Keetoowah 22:34, 20 July 2005 (UTC)

See the last paragraph before the picture: http://www.stanfordalumni.org/news/magazine/2005/julaug/features/rehnquist.html.


 * Um, how does this help? From what I can tell, it merely says that Rehnquist met the then-Day at Stanford, but doesn't affirm or reject the notion that he dated her. — DLJessup 13:20, 22 July 2005 (UTC)

Dear DLJessup: I agree with you the Stanford Alumni picture does not not provide us verification of really anything, other than what we were already quite sure of: Rehnquist and O'Connor were in law school together. Howeverwhile attempting to track down something definitive I stumbled on to an Arizona Republic article that indicates that the the old story about Rehnquist been 1st and O'Connor being 3rd in their class is a myth. Please read here Keetoowah 19:17, 22 July 2005 (UTC)
 * I have found a citation that has backed up the assertion that O'Connor and Rehnquist dated in law school. It is a news article from the Cox News Service you can view it here Keetoowah 19:31, 22 July 2005 (UTC)

Keetoowah:

The link about O'Connor's class standing being a myth points to the Google cache. Since the Google cache is particularly volatile, I placed a citation to it as a newspaper article in the "References" section so that, if the web link breaks, we could at least go to the library and find the dead tree version. — DLJessup 19:43, 22 July 2005 (UTC)


 * Mike Eagan: Were you friends with Sandra Day O'Connor in those days?
 * William Rehnquist: Oh, yeah. She was one of the entering class, but I don't think we really got to know each other until toward the end of the first year. Then I went and visited her at her family's ranch that summer. We dated some in the second year, and then we kind of went different ways.
 * http://www.law.stanford.edu/publications/lawyer/issues/72/1on1Rehnquist.html
 * —RandallJones 23:54, 3 October 2005 (UTC)