Sandra Day O’Connor began serving on the Supreme Court in 1981. Though she was appointed as a conservative, her ideology put her at odds with modern conservatives given her support for the right to abortion, equality-based legislation, and distancing church and state. During her time as a justice, some called the court “O’Connor Court” because of how much sway she held over key issues. Indeed, she was often the deciding vote on issues involving abortion, religion, sex discrimination, and more.
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Though some took O’Connor’s pragmatism as a lack of principles or commitment to a side, former clerk Marci Hamilton pushed back against such criticism. “Those would be the people who have never met her,” she said (per CNN). “Anyone who has met her knows that she makes up her own mind and is not at all concerned where anyone else is on the spectrum.”
