Speaker 1: Guess what will?
Speaker 2: What's that mango?
Speaker 1: So you know, one thing I'm pretty terrible at is
Speaker 1: time management, right yep, Like I always have too many
Speaker 1: commitments to try to get too many things done and
Speaker 1: end up a little late on everything. But one of
Speaker 1: my heroes in this regard is Sandra Day O'Connor.
Speaker 2: I can't say that I knew that she was known
Speaker 2: for her time management.
Speaker 1: Yeah, she was just a force at making things happen.
Speaker 1: Like one of my favorite examples is this one time
Speaker 1: when she was in the Arizona State Legislature and this
Speaker 1: was before she was on the Supreme Court, and it
Speaker 1: needed to pass its new budget before midnight, and everyone
Speaker 1: just assumed the thing was impossible, but O'Connor, she just
Speaker 1: insisted that they'd be done by six pm, and from
Speaker 1: her perspective, there was no other option because one of
Speaker 1: her sons was about to leave for summer camp and
Speaker 1: she promised to be home to bake the cookies in
Speaker 1: time before he headed off.
Speaker 2: Oh that's pretty great. So were they successful? Did they
Speaker 2: get it pushed through in time?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Because she's amazing, Like she was just insanely diplomatic
Speaker 1: but also no nonsense and super efficient. I mean, the
Speaker 1: idea of adding unwilling sized degree and compromise feels like
Speaker 1: a force we could use right now. But the budget
Speaker 1: passed with plenty of time, and presumably Sandra's son went
Speaker 1: on to be the most popular kid at summer camp.
Speaker 1: But Santa Day O'Connor's life is a pretty amazing one,
Speaker 1: and that's what we're about to dive into.
Speaker 2: Hey, their podcast listeners, welcome to Part Time Genius. I'm
Speaker 2: Will Pearson and as always I'm joined by my good
Speaker 2: friend mangesh Ha Ticketter and on the other side of
Speaker 2: the soundproof glass waving his homemade Scotus pennant. It's impressive.
Speaker 2: That's our friend and producer Tristan McNeil. I don't know
Speaker 2: if I've ever seen anyone so fired up about the
Speaker 2: judicial branch.
Speaker 1: Yeah, someone's been practicing his needle point.
Speaker 2: Well. In this case, Tristan's enthusiasm is totally warranted, because
Speaker 2: today's show us about a legal legend who's truly worth celebrating,
Speaker 2: and that's Sandra Day O'Connor. She often cast the deciding
Speaker 2: vote on all kinds of deadlock political and social issues,
Speaker 2: and whether you agree with her politics or not, there's
Speaker 2: no denying the impact O'Connor has had not just on
Speaker 2: our legal institutions, but also on the roles women serve
Speaker 2: within them. And as the first female justice, she showed
Speaker 2: the world exactly why women deserve a place on our
Speaker 2: nation's highest court.
Speaker 1: That's right. So I've been fascinated with Sandra Day for
Speaker 1: a while, and as you know, I commissioned a story
Speaker 1: on her at Mental Floss because I firmly believe more
Speaker 1: people need to know her extraordinary story. Actually, I think
Speaker 1: if I remember this spot, I wanted to pitch a
Speaker 1: TV show on her called Sandra Day O'Connor Stripmall Attorney.
Speaker 2: I don't know how that never happened.
Speaker 1: I know, I mean notorious RVG gets all this attention,
Speaker 1: but Sandra also deserves to be a folk hero, and
Speaker 1: we'll get into all of that. But since you're bringing
Speaker 1: up her biggest claim to fame, I wanted to mention
Speaker 1: the acronym O'Connor came up with for her achievements. You know,
Speaker 1: she was appointed to be the first woman on the
Speaker 1: Supreme Court in nineteen eighty one by President Reagan. But
Speaker 1: rather than spell out the title all the time, O'Connor
Speaker 1: liked to abbreviate it to FWOTSC.
Speaker 2: This kind of rolls off the telling. So was this
Speaker 2: really something she liked to go by.
Speaker 1: Yeah, she chose it herself, but it's got a good backstory.
Speaker 1: So apparently The New York Times published an article in
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty three, and it lamented is no Washington name
Speaker 1: exempt from shorthand the chief Magistrate sometimes goes by potus,
Speaker 1: the nine men who interpret them, or often the Scotis,
Speaker 1: but the people who enact them are still for better
Speaker 1: or worse Congress.
Speaker 2: I mean, I guess that's a moderately witty joke, right.
Speaker 1: No, but Saturday O'Connor had her own problem with the article.
Speaker 1: In a letter to the editor, she wrote, according to
Speaker 1: the information available to me, and which I had assumed
Speaker 1: was generally available for over two years now, Scotus has
Speaker 1: not consisted of nine men. If you have any contradictory information,
Speaker 1: I would be grateful if you would forward it, as
Speaker 1: I'm sure the Potus, the Scotis, and the undersigned the
Speaker 1: FWOTSC would be most interested in seeing that.
Speaker 3: I like that.
Speaker 2: She schooled the New York Times and coined her own
Speaker 2: nickname in one fell swoop there.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's pretty great, But I'm guessing part of the
Speaker 1: reason she was so peeved by the article was that
Speaker 1: she'd already dealt with so many public slights by that point.
Speaker 2: Well what do you mean by that?
Speaker 1: Well, O'Connor received a staggering sixty thousand letters during her
Speaker 1: first year on the job, and while most of the
Speaker 1: correspondence was positive, she got a good amount of hate mail.
Speaker 1: Like the negative letters were generally baseless enough to brush off,
Speaker 1: and it was stuff like back to your kitchen and home, female,
Speaker 1: this is a job for men, and only he can
Speaker 1: make the rough decisions. Just such a terrible note. Another
Speaker 1: person wrote in and said being a female justice was
Speaker 1: better suited for Marxist related feminists rather than a wife
Speaker 1: and a mother who respects the psychological component of a family.
Speaker 1: I mean, the letters just poured in.
Speaker 2: Good Lord, I mean, I could see why she would
Speaker 2: have bristled at the time story, and especially after having
Speaker 2: to sit through two years of this stuff.
Speaker 1: Exactly, even though she had been handpicked by the President
Speaker 1: and was unanimously conform by the Senate, there was still
Speaker 1: this large chunk of the population that couldn't stand the
Speaker 1: thought of a woman being in such a powerful position,
Speaker 1: and actually how she was picked by Reagan was pretty fascinating.
Speaker 1: We should talk a little about that in a bit.
Speaker 2: Well, definitely, but you know, thankfully O'Connor was made of
Speaker 2: much sterner stuff than her detractors, and her childhood upbringing
Speaker 2: all but assured that.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So, for those who don't know, sandur Day was
Speaker 1: born and raised on her family's enormous cattle ranch. This
Speaker 1: was on the New Mexico Arizona border, and it's called
Speaker 1: the Lazy Bee Ranch. It's actually named after a bit
Speaker 1: of rancher LINGO. I didn't realize this before, but apparently
Speaker 1: when a letter used on the cattle brand is applied
Speaker 1: in a crooked manner, so that the letters on its side,
Speaker 1: in this case the bee, it's said to be lazy.
Speaker 2: Oh. I never knew that. I don't know how both
Speaker 2: of us admits that, because we're cattle ranchers.
Speaker 1: Right, yeah, yeah, big time cattle aficionados. But the LazyB
Speaker 1: was actually this massive piece of land. It was one
Speaker 1: hundred and sixty thousand acres or roughly two hundred and
Speaker 1: fifty square miles. And because I know you prefer to
Speaker 1: like get your measurements and really to Rhode Island. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it did the math, and the rash breaks down to
Speaker 1: about one fifth the size of Rhode Island.
Speaker 2: I really appreciate you doing the math for me on
Speaker 2: that one. But you know, we were talking about this
Speaker 2: a little earlier, and just because the Day family had
Speaker 2: so much land, that doesn't mean they were living well.
Speaker 2: In fact, the property, which had been passed down for
Speaker 2: a couple of generations, it really wasn't worth all that
Speaker 2: much when Sanders dad inherited it. It was a one
Speaker 2: bedroom house that they lived in there, didn't have electricity,
Speaker 2: didn't have running water. They're basically scraping together enough income
Speaker 2: just to survive in this constant struggle there. But the
Speaker 2: family had an unrelenting work ethic, so they'd repair wells
Speaker 2: and raise cattle for slaughter. And the really crazy thing
Speaker 2: is that with all that acreage and about a thousand
Speaker 2: head of cattle to look after, the Day family kept
Speaker 2: this ridiculously tiny staff on hand to oversee it. I
Speaker 2: think there were just like five full time employees year round,
Speaker 2: and another few that came on for the big roundup,
Speaker 2: so that happened each spring and fall. So it was
Speaker 2: a really really small crew, I know, for a lot
Speaker 2: of land, which is probably why say had to help
Speaker 2: out so much herself. I mean, she grew up around
Speaker 2: literal cowboys, and at a young age she was branding cattle,
Speaker 2: driving tractors, and even warding off coyotes with her trusty
Speaker 2: twenty two caliber rifle. I mean, this is exactly the
Speaker 2: childhood that you expect from any Supreme Court justice.
Speaker 1: I know, well not at all, but the hardscrabvel lifestyle
Speaker 1: did teach Sandra all kinds of important life lessons. For example,
Speaker 1: there was one ranch hand in particular who she credits
Speaker 1: for some of the early lessons in fairness and empathy.
Speaker 1: His name was Raphael Estrada, and he's got an amazing
Speaker 1: story too. He was this illiterate Mexican American who'd worked
Speaker 1: for the family his whole life, and he grew so
Speaker 1: adept at ranching that he could actually identify almost every
Speaker 1: cow on the ranch just by a look. But Sandra
Speaker 1: later wrote of him, he knew he was very good
Speaker 1: at what he did, and he demanded a high standard
Speaker 1: from those around him, but he was dealt with what
Speaker 1: many would say was a poor hand in life. He
Speaker 1: was small, crippled, fatherless, a minority race in his birthland,
Speaker 1: but he played the he was dealt like a master
Speaker 1: from rostas we learned the contentment of doing the best
Speaker 1: you can with what you have.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and you know, you hear a lot about her
Speaker 2: practicality on the bench coming from her lessons that she
Speaker 2: learned back on the farm, and it was really a
Speaker 2: deep part of who she was. But I know her
Speaker 2: father also imparted some tough wisdom in those early years.
Speaker 2: You know, there's that great story I think we've talked
Speaker 2: about this before where she learned, you know, how to
Speaker 2: change a tire when she got a flat.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you should tell the listeners because it's such a
Speaker 1: great story and it's pretty cinematic.
Speaker 2: Right. So this was back when Sandra was just about fifteen,
Speaker 2: I think, and this was in nineteen forty five. So
Speaker 2: she'd offered to bring lunch to her father and his ranchands.
Speaker 2: They were busy branding cattle on the far end of
Speaker 2: the property, so early that hot summer morning, she heads
Speaker 2: out in their old Chevy pickup and heads out to
Speaker 2: the desert by herself. She's cruising along this remote dirt
Speaker 2: road and she suddenly gets a flat tire. Now, she's
Speaker 2: never changed a flat before, but she understands the basics.
Speaker 2: So she spends the next hour stranded in the heat.
Speaker 2: She figures out how to the car up, starts wrestling
Speaker 2: with the rusty lugnuts, but the things won't budge. She
Speaker 2: starts to panic for a minute because it's almost lunchtime
Speaker 2: and everybody is counting on her to get there with
Speaker 2: the food. Then she fits the wrench around each of
Speaker 2: the nuts and starts jumping on it with all her
Speaker 2: weight until finally the rust gives way and she manages
Speaker 2: to get the tire changed.
Speaker 1: So I mean, it sounds like the success story and
Speaker 1: this lesson in perseverance.
Speaker 2: Exactly, and that's no doubt how Sander viewed it. In fact,
Speaker 2: she proudly explained the whole story when she finally made
Speaker 2: it to where the crew was working. You know, she'd
Speaker 2: gotten up early that morning but then got stranded in
Speaker 2: the middle of nowhere with this flat tire, bunch of
Speaker 2: rusted lug nuts, but which she'd arrived late, well after lunchtime.
Speaker 2: So her father didn't share any of her sense of victory.
Speaker 2: He just kind of balled her out, saying, you should
Speaker 2: have started a lot earlier. You need to expect anything
Speaker 2: out there.
Speaker 1: Which he really takes to heart.
Speaker 2: Right Well, Yes, Sander wrote of the experience later on,
Speaker 2: She said, I had expected a word of praise for
Speaker 2: changing the tire, But to the contrary I realized is
Speaker 2: that the only thing was expected an on time lunch,
Speaker 2: no excuses accepted.
Speaker 1: And that story sounds like a folksy story a politician
Speaker 1: would sell you, but you can actually see how it
Speaker 1: made her work twice as hard and be prepared for
Speaker 1: any situation. I know that when ken Starr went to
Speaker 1: vetter for the Supreme Court, this was when she was
Speaker 1: just a nominee. He mentioned that it was like she'd
Speaker 1: been preparing for the Supreme Court all her life. At
Speaker 1: the time, people assumed Sandra was this lightweight and that
Speaker 1: she was only on the list because Reagan had made
Speaker 1: this campaign promise that he'd add a woman to the
Speaker 1: Supreme Court if he had the chance. But when Star
Speaker 1: met her and she really did have this non traditional
Speaker 1: path to the Supreme Court, he was floored by her
Speaker 1: depth of knowledge. But let's get back to the ranch.
Speaker 1: While her dad was tough, he clearly had this softer
Speaker 1: side as well, and he and Sandra's mother recognized how
Speaker 1: smart she was and knew that she couldn't get the
Speaker 1: formal education she deserved on the ranch. I mean, she
Speaker 1: kind of always lived in two worlds. There's a great
Speaker 1: line in that mental Flaw story where her days could
Speaker 1: start with her reading Nancy drew lying on her, and
Speaker 1: with her having to mercy kill a calf. It's sort
Speaker 1: of incredible. But her double life grew even more extreme
Speaker 1: when her parents sent her to live with her grandmother
Speaker 1: in El Paso, Texas, and that's where she attended this
Speaker 1: all girls private school for her primary education. It gave
Speaker 1: her this view into high society and it kind of
Speaker 1: put a new polish on her. She learned how to
Speaker 1: dress and charm people and all these various social graces
Speaker 1: in addition to giving her much better access to studies.
Speaker 1: But then, just a year after the tire incident, Sandra
Speaker 1: was allowed to skip two grades and go straight to
Speaker 1: Stanford University at the age of sixteen.
Speaker 2: Wow. I mean again, it just points to how bright
Speaker 2: she is. I feel like the college bit of her
Speaker 2: story does get glossed over sometimes. I was looking a
Speaker 2: little bit deeper into it in our research here and
Speaker 2: it's amazing. I mean, there's these two incredibly formative things
Speaker 2: that happened to her while she's there at Stanford. Now,
Speaker 2: the first was when she met a law professor named
Speaker 2: Harry Rathman. And he was one of those professors who
Speaker 2: would hold these informal gatherings at his home every Sunday.
Speaker 2: He invites students to talk about the meaning of life
Speaker 2: and all these other high minded matters. You might remember
Speaker 2: that Sandra had enrolled as an econ major. I didn't,
Speaker 2: but it was her encounters with Rathmann that convinced her
Speaker 2: to change course. The professor would make these forceful arguments
Speaker 2: about civic duty and the satisfaction that comes from serving
Speaker 2: your community. And for Sandra, who'd grown up as this
Speaker 2: independent cowgirl some like twenty five miles from her closest neighbor,
Speaker 2: it really did strike a chord with her, so much
Speaker 2: so that she decided to go to law school and
Speaker 2: devote her life to public service.
Speaker 1: I mean, it always comes down to a great professor, right, Yeah.
Speaker 1: But okay, so what's the other life changing thing that
Speaker 1: happens while Sander's in college.
Speaker 2: Well after she graduated at the age of twenty Sandra
Speaker 2: started attending Stanford Law School, which is actually where she
Speaker 2: met the love of her life and future husband, and
Speaker 2: that was John J. O'Connor, and their courtship story is
Speaker 2: actually pretty cute, so I'm gonna share it here. So
Speaker 2: John was a fellow law student and he and Sander
Speaker 2: were assigned a project to work on together, and they
Speaker 2: weren't quite finished when the library was closing up one night,
Speaker 2: so John suggested they finish their work over a beer
Speaker 2: at a little place he knew just down the road.
Speaker 2: And apparently they really hit it off there, because you know,
Speaker 2: not only did they do the same thing the next night,
Speaker 2: they actually went out for a solid forty nights in
Speaker 2: a row.
Speaker 1: I never heard that. Did she ever take him home
Speaker 1: to the ranch?
Speaker 2: Oh? She did, and it was just as awkward as
Speaker 2: you might expect. So the first time John came to
Speaker 2: meet Sandra's parents, her father was actually branding some calves,
Speaker 2: so they went down to the corral so John could
Speaker 2: say hello to him. And now the thing to know
Speaker 2: is that when male calves are branded, the ranchers generally
Speaker 2: castrate them as well.
Speaker 1: Oh no, so I think I know where this is going.
Speaker 2: I'm willing to bet that you do not know where
Speaker 2: this is going. In fact, I'm just gonna let Sandra
Speaker 2: tell the story herself. So, according to her, when she
Speaker 2: and John arrived, quote, my father put a few testicles
Speaker 2: on some bailing wire and put them in a branding fire,
Speaker 2: and he said, I'll just fix a few of these
Speaker 2: for you, John, And John, to his credit, took the
Speaker 2: things off the wire, popped him in his mouth and said,
Speaker 2: very good, mister day, very good.
Speaker 1: Oh and no, sauce, I.
Speaker 2: Would be so far down the street by that. But
Speaker 2: that is real love. And you know, Sandra obviously knew
Speaker 2: John was a keeper at that point, so it's really
Speaker 2: no surprise that they got married soon after. And that
Speaker 2: was in nineteen fifty two, which happened to be the
Speaker 2: same year they graduated from law school.
Speaker 1: All right, well, what do you say we move off
Speaker 1: the ranch and talk about Sandra's early law career.
Speaker 2: That sounds great, but first let's take a quick break.
Speaker 2: You're listening to part Time Genius and we're talking about
Speaker 2: the life and times of Sandra Day O'Connor. All right, mango,
Speaker 2: so I know we're leaving the Lazy b ranch behind,
Speaker 2: but before we do that, I wanted to share one
Speaker 2: last reflection on it from the woman herself, and this
Speaker 2: is from a part in her memoir where she's recounting
Speaker 2: what it was like to join her father and the
Speaker 2: ranch crew on these roundups. You know, they had to
Speaker 2: steer cattle sleeping out on the open range alongside a
Speaker 2: bunch of cowboys. So Sander writes, it had been an
Speaker 2: all male domain. Changing it to accommodate a female was
Speaker 2: probably my first initiation into joining an all men's club,
Speaker 2: something I did more than once in my life. After
Speaker 2: the cowboys understood that a girl could hold up her end,
Speaker 2: it was much easier for my sister, my niece, and
Speaker 2: the other girls and young women who followed to be
Speaker 2: accepted in that rough and tumble world.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's amazing to think she was really breaking down
Speaker 1: barriers for women from the beginning. And it's definitely true
Speaker 1: what she says about having to fight her way into
Speaker 1: the boys clubs. I mean, Sandra was one of the
Speaker 1: top students in her class at law school, and by
Speaker 1: the way, she actually ranked third in her class, with
Speaker 1: the top spot going to another future Scotus member, William Rehnquist.
Speaker 1: But when she graduated, not a single law firm was
Speaker 1: willing to hire her. In fact, when she did finally
Speaker 1: land an interview with a California law firm, it was
Speaker 1: only because of a favor of friend's father had given her.
Speaker 2: And is that how she got her first job as
Speaker 2: a lawyer.
Speaker 1: No, that's not even the case. So when she went
Speaker 1: to la for the interview, the firm made it clear
Speaker 1: that they'd never hired a female lawyer before and they
Speaker 1: didn't intend to start, And instead they asked her how
Speaker 1: well she could type and offered to bring her on
Speaker 1: as a legal secretary.
Speaker 2: No way. Yeah, it's really crazy to think about how
Speaker 2: recent a change it is to have women practicing law.
Speaker 2: It only started happening in the US around World War Two,
Speaker 2: like so many other fields, where women started taking these
Speaker 2: jobs because the men were overseas. But even then the
Speaker 2: change was exceedingly slow. Even by the time Sandra was
Speaker 2: looking for work in the early nineteen fifties, only three
Speaker 2: percent of the country's lawyers were women. The number has
Speaker 2: risen a great deal since then, obviously thanks in no
Speaker 2: small part, of course, to Sandra, but even now only
Speaker 2: thirty three percent of the lawyers are female.
Speaker 1: Which is staggering right, like I would imagine it was
Speaker 1: much higher. But let's get back to Sandra's job hunt.
Speaker 1: So the turning point came when she caught wind of
Speaker 1: a firm in San Mateo that actually had a female
Speaker 1: lawyer on staff. So she went to the office and
Speaker 1: asked for a job, but the county attorney there said
Speaker 1: they didn't have the budget for a new hire or
Speaker 1: even a place for her to work. But Sandra knew
Speaker 1: this was the only place where she'd be able to
Speaker 1: get a foot in the door, so she actually convinced
Speaker 1: the firm to take her on by agreeing to work
Speaker 1: for free and to share desk space with the secretary.
Speaker 2: I mean, you've got to admire her passion, but what
Speaker 2: a raw deal.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and things didn't really improve on the career front
Speaker 1: for a while, so after marrying John, they moved to Phoenix,
Speaker 1: where Sandra opened a little shop. It was this walk
Speaker 1: in practice. It was in the Strip mall. As I
Speaker 1: mentioned before, it was sort of like a better call
Speaker 1: Saul situation, where people would wander in to ask off
Speaker 1: end questions about I don't know, like the legality of
Speaker 1: something their landlord did, or how to beat a speeding ticket.
Speaker 1: And it's really kind of upsetting when you think about, like,
Speaker 1: she's this incredible legal mind, third in her class. She
Speaker 1: edits the law review at Stanford. You know, she keeps
Speaker 1: up with this for a few years, all while getting
Speaker 1: more and more involved with local Republican politics.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and it's around this time that Sandra actually steps
Speaker 2: away from her practice for I think it was like
Speaker 2: five or six years a stay at home mom for
Speaker 2: her three boys. And I'd say stay at home, but honestly,
Speaker 2: Sanders stayed so busy with all these various volunteer, civic
Speaker 2: and community groups that it's pretty much a misnomer to
Speaker 2: say stay at home. I mean, listen to the rap
Speaker 2: sheet that I was looking at here, it says O'Connor
Speaker 2: served on the Governor's Committee on Marriage and Family, as
Speaker 2: an administrative assistant at the Arizona State Hospital. She volunteered
Speaker 2: at a school for minorities. She wrote test questions for
Speaker 2: the Arizona Bar Exam, acted as an advisor to the
Speaker 2: Salvation Army.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it doesn't sound like she did too much staying
Speaker 1: at home, not at all. And after the kids were
Speaker 1: a little older, she went right back to work in earnest.
Speaker 1: At first, she was a part time assistant for the
Speaker 1: attorney general because no private firm was willing to hire
Speaker 1: her yet. But then the Arizona governor was so impressed
Speaker 1: with her work that he appointed her to a vacant
Speaker 1: seat in the state Senate, and the next year, in
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy, Sandra formally won the seat, and just a
Speaker 1: few months later, her fellow Republicans voted her in as
Speaker 1: America's first female state majority leader.
Speaker 2: Oh, it's pretty amazing. Well, she's got all kinds of
Speaker 2: first under her belt when you look at the list,
Speaker 2: As you know, I'm always so impressed by the way
Speaker 2: she was able to apply experience, you know, as a
Speaker 2: mother and a homemaker to this role as a stateswoman. Really, actually,
Speaker 2: I'm going to quote the mental flaw story you mentioned earlier,
Speaker 2: and this is from Lizzie Jacob's riding. O'Connor knew what
Speaker 2: she wanted to remove sexism from the books. She searched
Speaker 2: for laws biased against women and quietly worked to change them.
Speaker 2: The Republicans had a razor thin majority, negotiations were essential.
Speaker 2: She regularly hosted parties at her Adobe house, inviting leaders
Speaker 2: from all sides to eat homemade burritos, not to broke
Speaker 2: her deals, but to get to know one another. Her
Speaker 2: cooking was legendary, but it worked. She was all business.
Speaker 1: I'd forgotten that, and I want to eat homemade burritos
Speaker 1: at Sanders House too, And you're right. It's amazing how
Speaker 1: she was able to balance all these different responsibilities without compromise.
Speaker 1: And actually that pretty much takes us up to the
Speaker 1: time when President Reagan tapped her to replace the retiring
Speaker 1: Justice Stewart.
Speaker 2: Yeah, she was serving on the Arizona State Court of
Speaker 2: Appeals when she was invited to Washington to meet the
Speaker 2: president back in nineteen eighty one, and she really didn't
Speaker 2: want to go, but the two hit it off off
Speaker 2: right away. They were swapping stories about horse riding and
Speaker 2: the Western way of life. And as we've talked about before,
Speaker 2: Reagan had won the woman's vote by campaigning on this
Speaker 2: promise that he would nominate a woman to the Supreme Court,
Speaker 2: and in Sandra, he found the perfect candidate.
Speaker 1: So I know there's a lot of Reagan worship for
Speaker 1: a bunch of different reasons, but one of the things
Speaker 1: I found fascinating and hearing this story was that his
Speaker 1: advisors were actively telling him he didn't have to keep
Speaker 1: his promise, like there was so much swirling at the
Speaker 1: time politically. This was even the year that he was
Speaker 1: shot in that assassination attempt, and his advisors claimed just
Speaker 1: having a woman on the list was enough to you know,
Speaker 1: appease his voters. But to Reagan's credit, he kept his word.
Speaker 1: And of course conservatives like Philis Schaffey and Jerry Folwell
Speaker 1: they started this write in to protest the nomination. But
Speaker 1: once she was sworn in, the then fifty one year
Speaker 1: old O'Connor set herself apart not only by her gender
Speaker 1: and relative youth, but also with this level headed approach
Speaker 1: to cases. As one of her cleric saw, ron Ell
Speaker 1: Anderson Jones later recalled, quote eternally a ranch girl. She
Speaker 1: wanted solutions that really worked and had little patience for
Speaker 1: esoteric theory that had no grounding in reality.
Speaker 2: Well, and that's something we see from the start of
Speaker 2: her time on the bench, you know. For example, the
Speaker 2: Supreme Court heard a case in nineteen eighty two called
Speaker 2: Mississippi University for Women Versus Hogan. This was a case
Speaker 2: where a male student, Hogan was suing because he'd been
Speaker 2: denied admission to an all female nursing school, and O'Connor
Speaker 2: actually sided with the student, believing that the gender based
Speaker 2: enrollment policy was invalid. She said, because it, you know,
Speaker 2: it tends to perpetuate the stereotype view of nursing as
Speaker 2: this exclusively women's job. And so rather than siding with
Speaker 2: the women of the college in the short term, O'Connor
Speaker 2: was taking a practical approach and think about helping them
Speaker 2: break down the stigma that surrounded this nursing profession. And
Speaker 2: not only that, O'Connor later alluded to the ruling as
Speaker 2: a way to potentially boost the pay rates, you know,
Speaker 2: for all these nurses and thinking about doing so with
Speaker 2: this influx of male nurses. That was, you know, kind
Speaker 2: of turning the gender wage gap to the women's advantage
Speaker 2: as much as possible.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's pretty clever, and we should definitely talk more
Speaker 1: about some of her work on the bench. You know,
Speaker 1: she was there for twenty plus years, not to mention
Speaker 1: the legacy she left behind after retiring. But first, how
Speaker 1: about we take a quick break.
Speaker 2: All right, mango, it's quiz time.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 2: We've got a listener on the line, a regular listener
Speaker 2: of Part Time Genius, who actually wrote to us telling
Speaker 2: us about her love of sloths after we did a
Speaker 2: nine things on sloths, and she's on the line with
Speaker 2: us right now. Katie Coile, Welcome to Part Time Genius.
Speaker 3: Hi guys, happy to be here.
Speaker 2: All right, Katie, you have to tell us why do
Speaker 2: you love sloths so much? And was there anything that
Speaker 2: we missed in that episode that you feel like our
Speaker 2: listeners need to know?
Speaker 3: You know, I think I love slots specifically because Charles
Speaker 3: Darwin and Survival of the Fit should have gotten them already,
Speaker 3: but they're still kicking and they are a relic of evolution.
Speaker 3: And once you tell people you love slops, you get
Speaker 3: slap gifts for every possible holiday. So I get a
Speaker 3: little too deep in to give up now, you know.
Speaker 2: I feel like that's true because we've known a couple
Speaker 2: of sloth lovers and are actually especially at Mental Floss,
Speaker 2: and it did feel like anytime a special occasion came around,
Speaker 2: everyone was giving them sloth gifts.
Speaker 3: It makes me easier to shop for, so I'm really
Speaker 3: helping everyone.
Speaker 2: Wow, that's so thoughtful of you. And we decided to
Speaker 2: have Katie on for today's quiz because she has a
Speaker 2: very special connection to the Supreme Court. Katie, tell us
Speaker 2: what that is.
Speaker 3: Ruth Vader Ginsberg and I are both sorority sisters. We're
Speaker 3: very good friends. Obviously.
Speaker 2: Well that's awesome. Well, let's get started with the quiz.
Speaker 2: Number one. Justice Thirgood Marshall was addicted to Days of
Speaker 2: Our Lives and would often call a recess set one
Speaker 2: PM to watch his stories. Supreme or not Supreme?
Speaker 3: Please let that be supreme?
Speaker 1: It is? His wife claimed he would watch anything on TV,
Speaker 1: from wrestling to news to talk shows, but he especially
Speaker 1: loved Days of Our Lives.
Speaker 2: One for one question number two. The Justices enjoy celebrating
Speaker 2: each other's birthdays, and for years, Ruth Bader Ginsberg's husband, Martin,
Speaker 2: made all the cakes for everyone's birthday. Supreme or not Supreme?
Speaker 3: Supreme?
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's true. Marty's fondness for the kitchen began shortly
Speaker 1: after RVG cooked her first meal for him.
Speaker 2: Apparently you're doing pretty well so far, Katie. All right,
Speaker 2: let's see question number three. Since nineteen ninety six, lawyers
Speaker 2: who argue a case before the Supreme Court get a
Speaker 2: special keepsake, a Supreme Court sleep mask that reads justice
Speaker 2: is blind. Supreme or not supreme?
Speaker 3: That sounds a little too weird. I'm going to say
Speaker 3: not supreme.
Speaker 1: You're right. They don't get a sleep mask, but each
Speaker 1: council does get two white feather quill pens for their effort.
Speaker 2: All right, good job, Okay, two left, number four. There's
Speaker 2: an image of Mohammed on the side of the Supreme Court.
Speaker 2: Supreme or not supreme?
Speaker 3: You know, despite separation of church and state. I feel
Speaker 3: like that might be supreme for whatever reason.
Speaker 1: You' doing. Amazing, Katie, It's true. While depictions of Mohammad
Speaker 1: are rare, the prophet is depicted in a relief with
Speaker 1: other lawmakers and icons of justice, including Solomon, Moses, Confucius,
Speaker 1: and HAMMARAVII.
Speaker 2: All right, let's see if we can bring it home
Speaker 2: with the final question and go five for five. Here
Speaker 2: we go. Justice Renquist loved the musical West Side Story
Speaker 2: so much that he often wore a tiny shark pin
Speaker 2: on his robes. Supreme or not supreme.
Speaker 3: As much as I want that to be true, I'm
Speaker 3: going to say that's not supreme.
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, Katie, you went five for five. You're
Speaker 1: absolutely right. He wasn't a West side story fan that
Speaker 1: we know, but he was a huge Gilbert and Sullivan fan,
Speaker 1: and he actually stitched gold stripes on his robe sleeves
Speaker 1: as a tribute to it. And he was also a
Speaker 1: notoriously bad dresser.
Speaker 2: Wow. All right, so how did how did Katie do today? Mango?
Speaker 1: She ran the table and went five for five, which
Speaker 1: gets her the big prize, an official PTG Certificate of Genius,
Speaker 1: and a part time Genius T shirt.
Speaker 2: Congrasts, Katie, that's wonderful. Well, thanks so much for joining
Speaker 2: us today, Katie.
Speaker 3: Thank you?
Speaker 1: Okay, Mango.
Speaker 2: So what else do you want to cover from O'Connor's
Speaker 2: time on the Supreme Court?
Speaker 1: Well, I was always struck by the times when she
Speaker 1: seemed to go her own way on what are typically
Speaker 1: partisan issues. I mean, don't get me wrong. O'Connor was
Speaker 1: a moderate conservative, and she tended to vote as such
Speaker 1: for the most part, but she also had a reputation
Speaker 1: for caring more about how legal matters would affect individuals
Speaker 1: than she did for towing the party line or even
Speaker 1: rigidly adhering to legal president. For instance, O'Connor bucked conservative
Speaker 1: expectations in nineteen ninety two, and this is when the
Speaker 1: court had to decide whether it was constitutional to require
Speaker 1: women to notify their spouses before getting an abortion, and
Speaker 1: in her written opinion, O'Connor called the measure quote repugnant
Speaker 1: to our present understanding of marriage and of the nature
Speaker 1: of the rights secured by the Constitution. Women do not
Speaker 1: lose the constitutionally protected liberty when they marry.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I remember that. And she actually cast the deciding
Speaker 2: vote to uphold row, if you remember, and drew a
Speaker 2: lot of iron from her Republican colleagues.
Speaker 1: Actually, yeah, O'Connor was responsible for the determining vote of
Speaker 1: a lot of five to four decisions, and this gave
Speaker 1: her a reputation as a swing vote, since you really
Speaker 1: couldn't predict where she'd come down on some of the
Speaker 1: more divisive issues. But she really hated that term.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's something I didn't remember, but found that interesting
Speaker 2: in doing the research for the episode. But she never
Speaker 2: liked being called a swing vote because she thought implied
Speaker 2: that maybe she liked principles and was kind of flighty
Speaker 2: or fickle in the way she made her decisions. And
Speaker 2: so she was both praised and criticized for casting these
Speaker 2: really narrow opinions, And she wasn't as interested in writing law.
Speaker 2: She wasn't deciding a case. So she actually listened case
Speaker 2: by case, and people who have argued in front of
Speaker 2: her said they really couldn't tell which way she would
Speaker 2: go just because she she truly took each case as
Speaker 2: a learning activity.
Speaker 1: Well, I mean, agree with him or not. She definitely
Speaker 1: had principles and I mean just look at some of
Speaker 1: her opinions during the George W. Bush administration. In two thousand,
Speaker 1: she cast the deciding vote that ended the Florida recount
Speaker 1: for the contested presidential race. But then in two thousand
Speaker 1: and four, she went against the man she helped elect
Speaker 1: when she faced the Hamdi versus Rumsfeld case. And this
Speaker 1: was the one where the court was tasked with deciding
Speaker 1: whether an American citizen is still entitled a due process
Speaker 1: after being named an enemy combandant by the president.
Speaker 2: So O'Connor in this one, she voted in favor of
Speaker 2: due process right.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And in her opinions, she reminded her party that
Speaker 1: a state of war is not a blank check for
Speaker 1: the president when it comes to the rights of the
Speaker 1: nation citizens.
Speaker 2: Yeah. And you know, we've talked a good bit today
Speaker 2: about O'Connor's rough and tumble upbringing and her determination in
Speaker 2: the face of unfair treatment. But I did want to
Speaker 2: touch a little bit on some of her softer, more
Speaker 2: playful qualities, because you know, it's the side of Supreme
Speaker 2: Court justices that we don't really see that much of, honestly.
Speaker 1: Sure, So what kind of stuff are you thinking of?
Speaker 2: Well? I kind of like that even though she had
Speaker 2: the same work ethic as her father, she still took
Speaker 2: the time to relax a little bit. You know. For instance,
Speaker 2: she was an avid tennis player, so for most of
Speaker 2: the year she was on the bench, she would plan
Speaker 2: this week long vacation in July where she and seven
Speaker 2: of her friends from Arizona. They dubbed themselves the Mobile
Speaker 2: Party Unit. They'd get together to play tennis and golf,
Speaker 2: as well as go horseback riding even whitewater rafting together.
Speaker 1: I love that. Another story I like is how O'Connor
Speaker 1: commandeer the Supreme Court's basketball court so she could hold
Speaker 1: these women only yoga and aerobics classes.
Speaker 2: Wait, I think we need to pause for a seconds.
Speaker 2: So there's a Supreme Court there, there's a basketball court
Speaker 2: at the Supreme Court.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's called the highest court in the land and
Speaker 1: it's located on the fifth floor of the Supreme Court building.
Speaker 2: I get it.
Speaker 1: It used to be just this place for old legal
Speaker 1: journals like that's where these the story. But in the
Speaker 1: nineteen forties some courthouse workers converted into a workout area,
Speaker 1: and then it was later turned into this full basketball court.
Speaker 1: And apparently O'Connor didn't want to give up the exercise
Speaker 1: routine she'd gotten used to in Arizona, and once she
Speaker 1: found out that other women there in the building wanted
Speaker 1: a place to work out as well, she booked the
Speaker 1: gym and asked the YWCA to send over an instructor
Speaker 1: to help them start up a class. I mean, the
Speaker 1: class really took off and they started meeting daily and
Speaker 1: they even got custom printed T shirts that read women
Speaker 1: work out at the Supreme Court. Isn't that awesome?
Speaker 2: I loeve is she co opted what must have been
Speaker 2: a pretty male dominated space before she came onto the
Speaker 2: scene there though, it just feels fitting seeing who she
Speaker 2: is it Actually it also reminds me of an interview
Speaker 2: I read about O'Connor where there was no women's bathroom
Speaker 2: at the Supreme Court when she first arrived, and the
Speaker 2: closest one was way down this hallway, far from the
Speaker 2: actual courtroom. So once again, in trough O'Connor fashion, she
Speaker 2: just took over the men's restroom near her chambers.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, it's crazy to think about, right, but
Speaker 1: I guess it was close to two hundred years before
Speaker 1: the Supreme Court finally got a female justice, so it
Speaker 1: wasn't something they'd ever planned for.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and it just underscores how much of a trailblazer
Speaker 2: O'Connor really was. I mean, she once remarked, it's all
Speaker 2: right to be the first to do something, but I
Speaker 2: certainly didn't want to be the last woman on the
Speaker 2: Supreme Court, and of course, thankfully she wasn't. And you know,
Speaker 2: the current sitting Supreme Court actually includes three women. Of course,
Speaker 2: there's Ruth Bader Ginsburg Soda Soda Mayor and Elena Kagan
Speaker 2: And O'Connor herself retired back in two thousand and five.
Speaker 2: As you may remember, she was caring for her husband, John,
Speaker 2: who'd been suffering for a while from Alzheimer's.
Speaker 1: Yeah, which, you know, it seems totally in keeping with
Speaker 1: the high value she's always placed on family, although she
Speaker 1: did continue to juggle projects well into her retirement. In
Speaker 1: two thousand and six, she started this free online civics
Speaker 1: education program. It's called is Civics. It's for middle schoolers.
Speaker 1: It basically allows students to research and argue actual cases
Speaker 1: and to take part in these mockups of realistic government situations.
Speaker 1: And according to O'Connor, this venture to make learning civics
Speaker 1: fun is one of the most important things she's ever done.
Speaker 2: And so how did she do that?
Speaker 1: Well, she turned it into a video game. Oh really, yeah,
Speaker 1: So here's how she explained the idea to parade. What
Speaker 1: we know is that kids like to play games on
Speaker 1: the computer. So I set up an advisory group of
Speaker 1: fabulous teachers to tell me what we needed to focus
Speaker 1: on in a civics course, and then we had games
Speaker 1: designed that focus on those parameters. Young people spend an
Speaker 1: average of forty hours a week in front of a screen.
Speaker 1: One or two hours a week would do to teach
Speaker 1: them civics and it seems to be working. I mean,
Speaker 1: Isivic is actually used by educators in all fifty states
Speaker 1: and about five million students use it each year.
Speaker 2: That's pretty awesome. Well, then after a lifetime of public service,
Speaker 2: it is inspiring that she still feels this drive to
Speaker 2: help spark the next generation's sense of civic duty. You know,
Speaker 2: given her track record, it's exactly what I would expect
Speaker 2: from her. And as she once put it, I'm not
Speaker 2: accustomed to sitting around and doing nothing, that's for sure.
Speaker 1: And now, what do you say we follow her lead
Speaker 1: and keep ourselves busy with a good old fashioned fact.
Speaker 2: Off, you know what, Mango, I say. This fact off
Speaker 2: is now in session.
Speaker 1: So I'm not sure if you watched the Senate hearings
Speaker 1: with Justice Roberts, but it was a little frustrating from
Speaker 1: the outside because he refused to show any of his
Speaker 1: opinions and his claim was that he needed the details
Speaker 1: of the case before he could speak about anything. And
Speaker 1: this has kind of become a fairly common and smart
Speaker 1: tactic for justices trying to be confirmed. But what's interesting
Speaker 1: is that Justice O'Connor actually used the same tactic during
Speaker 1: her hearings decades prior, and you could tell from her
Speaker 1: opinions that she really believed that she needed the details
Speaker 1: and that they truly mattered. But one of the lawyers
Speaker 1: who assisted her for that hearing was a young Justice Roberts.
Speaker 2: Well, there's another thing I love about her judiciary hearing,
Speaker 2: and it she took the time to introduce her three
Speaker 2: sons to the chamber. She probably listed out where they'd
Speaker 2: gone to school, what they'd majored in, their hobbies and accomplishments,
Speaker 2: you know, like being a state swimming champ and skydiving,
Speaker 2: or being like the family writer. I mean, did all
Speaker 2: of these things she took the time to do. Isn't
Speaker 2: that pretty amazing?
Speaker 1: I love that. So one thing I love is how
Speaker 1: playful she could be. So in two thousand and one
Speaker 1: she made a guest appearance at the Shakespeare Theater in
Speaker 1: DC where they put King Lear on trial and apparently
Speaker 1: her verdict was not mad all right?
Speaker 2: Well, did you know that she had a pet bobcat
Speaker 2: in her youth. Apparently she tamed one on her ranch
Speaker 2: back home. That's nuts.
Speaker 1: So there was a New York Times piece that said
Speaker 1: sander Dale O'Connor was the hardest judge to clerk for.
Speaker 1: And as you might guess, she wanted to know everything
Speaker 1: and she wanted to be fully able to defend any
Speaker 1: side of any opinion she made. So she really worked
Speaker 1: her staff, but she also deliberated an extraordinary amount over
Speaker 1: who she chose, like she picked clerks from a wide
Speaker 1: range of universities and across the political spectrum, because she
Speaker 1: both wanted rigorous candidates, but she also wanted to be
Speaker 1: challenged in her thoughts as well.
Speaker 2: Well. I did read on the other side of that,
Speaker 2: I guess you could say is that she would really
Speaker 2: close to her clerks. She'd organized these picnics to see
Speaker 2: the cherry blossoms, or host these jack o lantern carving parties,
Speaker 2: and even asked to see pictures and get updates on
Speaker 2: all of her grand clerks, as she called them.
Speaker 1: So here's a story that's kind of sweet and heartbreaking.
Speaker 1: Santade O'Connor cut her career short to be with her husband,
Speaker 1: who had severe Alzheimer's because she wanted to take care
Speaker 1: of him and make his life more comfortable. And when
Speaker 1: he went to a facility, he actually started a romance
Speaker 1: with a fellow patient. This is something that a lot
Speaker 1: of people with Alzheimer's do, but for her that meant
Speaker 1: supporting him through that as well. And as she put it,
Speaker 1: he was in a cottage and there was a woman
Speaker 1: who kind of attached herself to him. It was nice
Speaker 1: for him to have someone who was there to sometimes
Speaker 1: hold his hand and keep him company. And I'm glad.
Speaker 2: Wow, that is heartbreaking. All right, Well, here's a fun one,
Speaker 2: a very different note. Did you know Sanderday O'Connor is
Speaker 2: in the Cowgirl Hall of Fame? Id you know there
Speaker 2: was the Cowgirl Hall of Fame. Well, in her bio
Speaker 2: she talks about how she learned to ride and shoot
Speaker 2: a gun by the age of eight. And for the record,
Speaker 2: she's the only Supreme Court justice in the Cowgirl Hall
Speaker 2: of Fame, but you know the door is wide open
Speaker 2: for future cowgirls to join her.
Speaker 1: I like that and I like ending on something up feet.
Speaker 1: So what do you say you take this week's trophy?
Speaker 2: All right? Well, thanks so much. Well, if we have
Speaker 2: missed any facts about Sandra Day O'Connor, or any Supreme
Speaker 2: Court justices for that matter, we would love to hear
Speaker 2: from you. You can always email us part time genius at
Speaker 2: HowStuffWorks dot com or call on our twenty four to
Speaker 2: seven fact hotline that's one eight four four pt Genius.
Speaker 2: You can also hit us up on Facebook or Twitter.
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