Sandra Day O’Connor- Case Journal #1

You many very well recognize my name. I hold the honor of being the first female to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court. Spending time on the court allows me to have influence on some hard hitting cases and has given me the opportunity to uphold the Constitution.

I come from a humble beginning from a ranch in El Paso, Texas. I spent my childhood outside riding horses. I have faced adversity through every step I have taken in life. I attended Stanford University and received my degree and law degree in 1952. I fought to find employment, but the field was saturated with men. I got my first taste of a career when I served as a civilian lawyer in Frankfurt, Germany two years after graduation.

After coming back to America in 1957, I moved to Arizona and dabbled around in many political and judicial careers until I was appointed to the Arizona Senate in 1969 and eventually the state’s court of appeals in 1979. Finally, in 1981, I was appointed by President Ronald Reagen to serve in the U.S. Supreme court. I received across the board approval from the members of the Senate.

I can be identified as a moderate conservative. I have been faced with allegations of not adhering to party lines in terms of abortion, and the liberals are sometimes upset at my stance on several feminist issues. People were at first discontent at my lacking experience and lack of constitutional knowledge mastery. I have shocked them all though when I overcame this adversity and proved to take all of my cases thus far carefully and uphold the law and the Constitution.

The case I am now presented with is Associated Press v. United States. From what I have gathered from this case so far, it appears as though the struggle is between privacy and national security. The government claims that they acquired private communications to promote national security and to make sure that no plotting against the government was occurring when whistle blower Edward Snowden broke alleged information of the government’s surveillance programs.

Jewel v. National Security Agency definitely sets the precedent for this case. Although the case was dropped, it shows the struggle between government and personal privacy.

I am curious to see how this case is decided. I certainly am formulating my own opinions on what I am seeing and reading thus far, but in the end of the day I will uphold what is deemed right by the supreme law of this land, the Constitution.

http://www.biography.com/people/sandra-day-oconnor-9426834

http://www.oyez.org/justices/sandra_day_oconnor

http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/justices/oconnor.bio.html