Reply to Professor Tarpley's Comment Regarding Justice Sandra Day O'Connor
January 2002
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ESSAY
REPLY TO PROFESSOR TARPLEY' SCOMMENT REGARDING JUSTICE SANDRA DAY O'CONNOR
JEAN HOEFER TOAL•
INTRODUCTION 267
BACKGROUND 268
PROFESSOR TARPLEY'S ATTACK ON JUSTICE O'CONNOR 270
THE EVOLUTION OF THE STRICT SCRUTINY STANDARD FOR EQUAL PROTECTION CHALLENGES TO RACE-BASED
CLASSIFICATIONS 271
POST-CROSON: METROBROADCASTINGANDADARAND 275
THE IMPACT OF PERSONAL ATTACKS ON JUDICIAL INDEPENDENCE. 279
CONCLUSION 282
INTRODUCTION
The Fall 2001 book of the South Carolina Law Review contains an essay by Joan Tarpley, J.D., Professor of Law at the Walter F. George School of Law, Mercer University entitled,A Comment on Justice O'Connor's Quest for Power and Its Impact on African American Wealth.1 The essay is an overheated, sensational personal attack masquerading under the guise oflegal scholarship. Its thesis is that Justice O'Connor is a white supremacist who, through her opinion in City of Richmond v. J.A. Croson Co.,2 seeks to dismantle affirmative action jurisprudence and strengthen her position as the swing vote on the United States Supreme Court in order to exercise the power of Chief Justice, in fact, if not in name.
Selection to the editorial staff of the South Carolina Law Review in the spring ofmy first year oflaw school remains one of the proudest events ofmy
•Chief Justice, Supreme Court of South Carolina.
Joan Tarpley, A Comment on Justice O'Connor's Quest/or Power and Its Impact on African American Wealth, 53 S.C. L. REv. 117 (2001).
- 488 U.S. 469 (1989).
267