Sandra Day O'Connor, a mild-mannered jurist, became a trailblazer despite not projecting that image. Born to cattle ranchers Henry Day and Ada Wilkey, she was a true child of the frontier, learning to brand cattle and run a household on their 155,000-acre ranch. She wrote about her childhood in the autobiography "Lazy B: Growing up on a Cattle Ranch in the American Southwest."
As a high achiever in school, O'Connor graduated from high school at 16 and later from Stanford Law School, third in a class of 102. She married in 1952 and sought work in major law firms, but women lawyers were rare at the time. She worked as a prosecutor in county offices before establishing her own private practice in Phoenix in 1960.
O'Connor became involved in Republican politics and was appointed Assistant Attorney General for the state of Arizona in 1965. She was later appointed to the Arizona state Senate to fill a vacant seat in 1969 and became the first woman to become Majority Leader in an American state Senate in 1973.
In 1975, she was elected Maricopa County Superior Court Judge and served with distinction before being appointed to the state Court of Appeals in 1979. Her impressive record and passion for law brought her to the attention of U.S. Senator Barry Goldwater, who highly regarded her.
O'Connor's nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court in 1981 surprised many, but she was confirmed unanimously. She compiled a moderate to conservative record on the court while ruling each case narrowly and avoiding precedent. In 1989, she became the center of national attention when she was the deciding vote in the Webster vs. Reproductive Health Services case.
Over the years, O'Connor became the swing vote on many 5-4 decisions, and her moderate stance earned her respect from both conservatives and liberals. In 2005, she announced her retirement from the court, and President George W. Bush appointed Samuel Alito to replace her.
Many who covered her career noted that O'Connor's views changed over time, but it was actually the court's composition that changed more than she did. She served with strong liberals and conservatives, and her later years on the court were marked by a more conservative tone and substance of its rulings.
