Today in Supreme Court History: September 25, 1981

9/25/1981: Justice Sandra Day O'Connor takes the oath.

Justice Sandra Day O'Connor

Comments

[Dan Schiavetta]

Tennant v. Jefferson County Comm'n, 567 U.S. 758 (decided September 25, 2012): full Court, reversing District Court, approves of West Virginia Legislature's reapportionment of its three Congressional seats, one of eight competing plans. This short decision goes through how the Court decides whether a redistricting comports with "one person, one vote": population differential (not dispositive; one of the rejected plans had a differential of only one person between the smallest and largest districts); whether incumbents would be forced into the same district; whether counties or cities would remain whole, etc. The approved plan had a differential of only 0.79% between the smallest and largest districts, which the Court admitted in these days of computerized analysis might be a "large" deviation, but o.k. here.

[Syd Henderson]

I always liked reading O'Connor's majority opinions. She was a very clear writer. I like reading Gorsuch among today's justices.

[Dan Schiavetta]

We all agreed at the time when we said, “That’s probably the best we can expect from Reagan”