the new republic P march 6, 2006 33 was able to attain what he could not at- the prison house of the author’s self to had been recorded. If Starr had taken tain elsewhere: the exercise of mastery, achieve universal sweep, in this case such a step he would have discovered in which the beautifully articulated for- probing human dreams and delusions that the proposed legislation was front- mal elements of the story lock together about justice and law and pondering an page news and the subject of consider- in an absorbing narrative whole. Like idea of writing as a painful revelation able controversy in Arizona eleven the best of his fiction, it moves beyond that collapses into murderous chaos. J years earlier—and that O’Connor had voted for the measure to decriminalize abortion.” Instead of undertaking his own in- David J. Garrow dependent inquiry, Biskupic observes, “Starr had taken O’Connor’s word for everything.” In so doing, he had The Unlikely Center smoothed her way to a nomination that almost certainly would have been denied her had those old news clippings been discovered. But in those days Supreme Sandra Day O’Connor: at all,” since O’Connor was a “judicial Court nominees, even potentially piv- How the First Woman on unknown,” but Reagan was intrigued by otal ones, were not investigated with the the Supreme Court O’Connor’s upbringing on an Arizona rigor that journalists would deploy to- Became Its Most cattle ranch. ward, or against, Harriet Miers and Sam- Influential Justice Starr flew to Phoenix to interview uel Alito twenty-four years later. By Joan Biskupic O’Connor, and then Smith called to in- (HarperCollins, 419 pp., $26.95) vite her to Washington. On July 1, Rea- Connor’s status as the gan and Smith, with presidential advis- first female nominee to the David Hackett Souter: ers Michael Deaver and James Baker, high court certainly did not Traditional Republican met with O’Connor for forty-five min- ’protect her from harsh on the Rehnquist Court utes. Reagan had won the presidency Ocriticism. The Nation lambasted O’Con- By Tinsley E. Yarbrough as a fervent right-to-life supporter, and nor as “barely qualified” and complained (Oxford University Press, O’Connor was asked directly for her that Reagan had chosen her “almost en- 311 pp., $29.95) views. “She told Reagan she was per- tirely because of her sex and not on the sonally against abortion,” Joan Biskupic basis of individual merit.” The Nation’s enneth W. Starr was reports in her superbly thorough and editors further declared that “O’Con- a gullible and slipshod perceptive biography.“She said she con- nor’s record is not even close to Supreme investigator. No, not in sidered the procedure ‘abhorrent.’ ” Court quality. She was not an exceptional his all-too-thorough probe When O’Connor’s name was leaked lawyer or legal scholar, nor is she an out- of Bill Clinton’s dalliance to reporters as a possible nominee, anti- standing judge.” In front of the Senate Ju- Kwith a White House intern, but seven- abortion activists objected, citing con- diciary Committee, however, O’Connor teen years earlier, when he was the cerns about O’Connor’s position as an acquitted herself flawlessly. Fred Bar- Reagan administration’s point man in Arizona state senator in 1970 on a bill bash of The Washington Post described the background vetting of a Supreme that would have decriminalized abor- O’Connor as “the very essence of com- Court nominee. tion. The measure never came to a floor posure and self-confidence: even-voiced During the presidential campaign in vote, but O’Connor had served on the and even-tempered.” She also reprised 1980, Ronald Reagan had declared that committee that considered it. “There is the denunciations of abortion that she if elected, “one of the first Supreme no record of how Senator O’Connor had offered Reagan. She attested to “my Court vacancies in my administration voted, and she indicated that she has no own abhorrence of abortion as a rem- will be filled by the most qualified wom- recollection of how she voted,” Starr edy” and added that it “is simply offen- an I can find.” A year earlier, Sandra wrote in a memo to Smith. Reagan and sive to me. It is something that is repug- Day O’Connor, then an Arizona Superi- his advisers discounted the abortion op- nant to me.” or Court judge, had met Chief Justice ponents’ complaints, and on July 7 the Biskupic observes that O’Connor’s Warren E. Burger, an inveterate political president announced O’Connor’s selec- three days of testimony “revealed little,” schmoozer, on a vacation outing. Soon tion. Journalists asked if he had person- but she rightly notes that confirmation thereafter, Governor Bruce Babbitt, a ally confirmed O’Connor’s right-to-life hearings, then as now, are “rituals de- Democrat, promoted O’Connor to Ari- sentiments, and Reagan answered “yes.” signed to appease rather than to ex- zona’s intermediate appeals court.When He was “completely satisfied.” pose.” No controversy over O’Connor’s the retirement of Justice Potter Stewart But Starr had committed a huge er- abortion record developed, and the Sen- in June 1981 presented President Rea- ror. On April 29, 1970, O’Connor had gan with his first high court vacancy,At- voted to repeal Arizona’s anti-abortion David J. Garrow, a senior fellow at torney General William French Smith al- law, and two prominent Phoenix news- Homerton College, Cambridge, is the ready had O’Connor’s name on his papers publicly reported her vote.When author of Liberty and Sexuality: private short list. Starr, then Smith’s top asked by Biskupic to explain his over- The Right to Privacy and the Making aide, later acknowledged that “there was sight, “Starr said he had no reason to of ROE v. WADE (University of Califor- a certain oddity to her being in the mix check local newspapers to see if her vote nia Press). 34 march 6, 2006 P the new republic ate unanimously approved her nomina- school, college, or bar association was Scalia’s first year was also Powell’s last. tion by a vote of ninety-nine to zero. too obscure or too distant for O’Connor “Your announcement leaves me devas- if a speaking invitation was extended. tated,” O’Connor wrote to Powell upon he Supreme Court bench O’Connor’s talks rarely offered signifi- learning of his retirement. He was “ir- that O’Connor joined in cant substance or notable stimulation, replaceable,” O’Connor told him, for September 1981 was a frac- and Biskupic does not explain what mo- “no one on the Court has been kinder tious and relatively leader- tivated her to travel hither and yon with than you. There is no one with whom I Tless group. Chief Justice Warren Burger a frequency that far outstripped any of have felt as free to discuss our cases and had lost his colleagues’ respect. William her colleagues. O’Connor’s ubiquity did how to resolve them.” J. Brennan Jr. could usually muster not endear her to everyone: when the In Biskupic’s account, O’Connor’s Thurgood Marshall and Harry A. Black- New York Women’s Bar Association an- increasing influence came largely at the mun on behalf of liberal rulings, but nounced an award to O’Connor in 1984, expense of Brennan. Brennan turned securing a majority required winning sixty lawyers and law professors signed eighty in 1986, and with the old lib- over the iconoclastic John Paul Stevens a protest letter calling it “incomprehen- eral “relying more on his clerks,” lead- and either the dour Byron R. White sible and extremely disturbing” that a ership of the Court began “slipping from or the genteel Lewis F. Powell. The women’s group would honor “token ap- Brennan’s grasp into O’Connor’s,” Bis- youngest justice, William H. Rehnquist, pointees who undermine our goals.” kupic writes. “O’Connor managed the possessed a conservative vision but resolution of cases in a way that increas- rarely prevailed in significant cases. nside the Court in the mid- ingly caught Brennan off guard,” and Biskupic offers excellent and original 1980s, O’Connor’s influence in- “in negotiations with other justices, she portrayals of the justices’ relations with creased as Powell weakened with often accentuated her state legislative one another. During O’Connor’s earli- age. Biskupic portrays Powell as and state court experience. Her message est years, “she collaborated with Powell, Ia “gentlemanly peacemaker” who was was that she knew the practical effects fell into an adversary role with Brennan, “the bridge between the ideological of rulings.” and was a regular target for Blackmun’s poles” that Brennan and Rehnquist rep- cutting remarks.” Powell became O’Con- resented. When a long hospital stay iskupic does an impressive nor’s “closest colleague,” and they in- kept Powell away from the Court in ear- job of emphasizing how O’Con- creasingly teamed up on difficult cases. ly 1985, “his absence exacerbated ten- nor’s six years as an Arizona Brennan’s and O’Connor’s substantive sions that had been rising” for months. state senator sharpened the legal views “differed sharply. But they Biskupic quotes at length from a mem- Bskills that allowed her to become an were even more at odds personally,” orable letter that Rehnquist wrote to influential justice. O’Connor served a Biskupic writes, Brennan’s reputation the absent Powell, recounting with re- stint as senate majority leader prior to as a judicial charmer notwithstanding.