I don’t think it’s the court’s perceived role to do some explaining of a political nature.
SANDRA DAY O'CONNORIf parents instill a sense of civic-mindedness – and there is no better way to do that than by example – their children will probably follow.
More Sandra Day O'Connor Quotes
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I finally gave up my little law practice and stayed home for about three years. You have to do what you can to keep the family going. But I wanted to get back to work. So I got another babysitter and went to work as an Assistant Attorney General.
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What was a problem was the excessive amount of media attention to the appointment of the first woman and everything she did. Everywhere that Sandra went, the press was sure to go. And that got tiresome; it was stressful.
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Having family responsibilities and concerns just has to make you a more understanding person.
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It is a measure of the framers’ fear that a passing majority might find it expedient to compromise 4th Amendment values that these values were embodied in the Constitution itself.
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Unfortunately civility is hard to codify or legislate, but you know it when you see it. It’s possible to disagree without being disagreeable.
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In order to cultivate a set of leaders with legitimacy in the eyes of the citizenry, it is necessary that the path to leadership be visibly open to talented and qualified individuals of every race and ethnicity.
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The fact is that knowledge about the Constitution and the Court is not something that is handed down through the gene pool; every generation has to learn it. And I’m not sure the recent generations have done that good a job of learning about it.
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If a State refused to let religious groups use facilities open to others, then it would demonstrate not neutrality but hostility toward religion.
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I have always thought that while it’s wonderful to be the first to do something, you don’t want to be the last.
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I think it’s inevitable that some of the court’s decisions will be found by a segment of the public to be not the right decision or subject to criticism.
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I think people know very little, really, about the court, how it works and its history. And both of those things are important in our country, but they’re not things that most citizens know much about.
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Do the best you can in every task, no matter how unimportant it may seem at the time. No one learns more about a problem than the person at the bottom.
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It is true that as you have children, there are a good many months when you don’t want to be working full-time. I agree that that’s an issue.
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The freedom to criticize judges and other public officials is necessary to a vibrant democracy. The problem comes when healthy criticism is replaced with more destructive intimidation and sanctions.
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[G]overnment endorsement . . . of religion . . . sends a message to nonadherents that they are outsiders, not full members of the political community, and an accompanying message to adherents that they are insiders, favored members of the political community.
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