Sandra Day O'Connor: How the First Woman on the Supreme Court Became Its Most Influential Justice

5471. Sandra Day O'Connor How the First Woman on the Supreme Court Became Its Most Influential Justice, by Joan Biskupic (read 16 May 2017) This book was published in 2005 and covers up to O'Connor's retirement in 2005 but she served on the Court till January 2006 so it does not cover quite all of her time on the Court. It is friendly to O'Connor but shows that she was a non-liberal when she was appointed but gradually she became a better justice, though fiercely Republican, as shown by her eagerness to put George W. Bush in the White House. But by the time she left the Court she was a better justice than when she was first there. We would have been a lot better off if she were there still rather than her successor, Justice Alito. The show more author went to Georgetown Law School and her handling of legal matters is good, though she makes no attempt to cover all of O'Connor's decisions--but she covers the main ones and does a good job on them. I found the book consistently attention-holding and never dull. I read the author's biography of Sonia Sotomayor on 26 June 2016 and liked it so well that I was eager to read this book and am glad I did. show less

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