Sunday political shows remember Arizona’s Sandra Day O’Connor: 'Here lies a good judge'

The Sunday morning public affairs television shows paid tribute to former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, who died on Friday at age 93.

The first woman to sit on the U.S. Supreme Court, O’Connor grew up on a ranch in Arizona, and worked her way up through the state’s Legislature and court system. Nominated to the Supreme Court by former President Ronald Reagan, she went on to become a decisive vote on the court for more than two decades, penning landmark opinions on issues including abortion and affirmative action.

“The Stanford law grad was initially offered jobs as a legal secretary. She became famous and powerful, the first female Supreme Court justice. Its nickname during her tenure, the O'Connor court,” CBS's Face the Nation said.

The program recalled how O’Connor disputed the characterization that she was the deciding vote in the Supreme Court case Bush v. Gore, whose outcome decided the 2000 presidential election in favor of former President George W. Bush.

“I don't see how you can say anybody was the deciding vote,” O’Connor said. “They all counted.”

“You have no regrets, I could say?” her interviewer asked.

“No,” O’Connor replied. “I mean it was a tough deal in a closely fought election. And it's no fun to be part of a group of decision-makers that has to decide which side the ball is going to fall on.”

George Stephanopolous, host of ABC News's program This Week, reaired an interview he did with O’Connor 20 years ago, towards the end of her time on the Supreme Court.

“Justice O'Connor, you have been on the court now a little over 20 years. How has your decision-making changed over the course of those 20 years?” Stephanopolous asked.

“Oh, I don't know that the decision-making has changed, but I've learned something during those years. I find that I'm still learning new things with many of the cases that come to us. A new subject matter of the law, a new approach, a new question we haven't previously addressed, that's why the job is interesting, because there are so many new things to learn,” O’Connor said.

During that exchange, which according to Stephanopolous was the first interview O’Connor had done on a Sunday show, the subject of O’Connor’s mortality came up.

“When President Reagan nominated you for the court, he paraphrased Longfellow, saying that Supreme Court justices truly leave footprints on the sands of time,” Stephanopolous said. “What do you expect your footprints to be?”

O’Connor’s response: “I've tried to deal with the tombstone question in the past and I've always just said that I hope at the end of the day, it can be said on my tombstone, here lies a good judge.”

Laura Gersony is a national politics reporter for The Arizona Republic and azcentral.com. Follow her on X, formerly known as Twitter, at @lauragersony.

This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Sunday shows remember Sandra Day O’Connor: "Here lies a good judge"