Sandra Day O'Connor, first female Supreme Court justice, and an Episcopalian, dies at 93
Justice Sandra Day O'Connor speaks as part of the McCloskey Speaker Series in 2010. (Nora Feller/The Aspen Institute)
Sandra Day O’Connor, the first woman appointed to the United States Supreme Court, died December 1 in Phoenix, Arizona, due to complications related to advanced dementia and a respiratory illness. She was 93.
O’Connor was baptized in the Episcopal Church and attended Sunday worship services at Washington National Cathedral during her tenure on the Court. She served on the cathedral chapter, the governing body of the congregation, for eight years.
“Justice O’Connor embodied an even-handed embrace of equal justice under law. By zealously clinging to the center, she rejected the false allure of polarized ideological purity,” said Washington Bishop Mariann Budde and Randolph Hollerith, the cathedral’s dean in a written tribute to O’Connor.
