March 10, 2008

Contact:
Michael Davis, 404-413-1361
University Relations

Former Justice O’Connor visits Georgia State

The U.S. Supreme Court’s first female justice will be returning to the campus of Georgia State University to help the College of Law mark another milestone.

Former Associate Justice Sandra Day O’Connor will deliver the 42nd Henry J. Miller Distinguished Lecture. She delivered an address in 1992 marking the College of Law’s 10th year. This time, the college is celebrating its silver anniversary.

The event will be from noon to 1:15 p.m. Tuesday, March 11 in the State Ballroom of the Student Center.

“She is one of the most influential justices of our time,” said Dean Steven J. Kaminshine. “We were very hopeful she could come to our 25th anniversary and see the progress we have made as a law school over the last 15 years.”

O’Connor was born in El Paso, Texas, and studied law in California. She served as an assistant attorney general in Arizona from 1965-1969 and later became a state senator there. Before her appointment to the Supreme Court during the Reagan administration, she served on the Arizona Court of Appeals.

“In her time on the Supreme Court, Justice O’Connor was often viewed as the ‘swing vote’ on important cases,” says law professor Mary Radford, who was a Supreme Court Fellow from 1990-1991, and got to know O’Connor while working in the office of then-Chief Justice William Rehnquist. “Rather than apply any preconceived agenda to a case, she took each case on its own facts and merits,” said Radford.

In 2006, O’Connor retired from the Court and that same year, Arizona State University renamed its law school the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law.

Her remarks Tuesday serve as the keynote address of the Georgia State University College of Law’s 25th anniversary celebration. The event is invitation only.