Summit Meeting: A number of the principals who helped prepare the November 12 high school program meet backstage before taking the stage at Yardley Hall. Pictured, from left: Meryl Justin Chertoff, Director of the Justice and Society Program at The Aspen Institute and Adjunct Professor at Georgetown Law School; J. Eugene Balloun, co-founder of the Johnson County First Amendment Foundation and partner, Shook, Hardy & Bacon L.L.P.; Sandra Day O’Connor, Associate Justice (ret.), United States Supreme Court; David J. Waxse, co-founder of the Johnson County First Amendment Foundation and Magistrate Judge, U.S. District Court for the District of Kansas; Tristan L. Duncan, program speaker liaison and partner, Shook, Hardy & Bacon L.L.P.; Ken S. Thomas, Member of the Advisory Committee of the Johnson County First Amendment Foundation and Teacher of Government and Advanced Placement U.S. Government, and We the People Coordinator, at Blue Valley Northwest High School; and Erin Braun, Director of Outreach for iCivics, Inc.

Photo by Elizabeth Kuhlmann

“A Full Auditorium of Eager Students”: Students are shown departing Yardley Hall after the November 12, 2013 “Conversation About the Constitution with Former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor.” Students and teachers arrived early – many at least 15 minutes before doors opened – on a bitterly cold November morning and filled the lobby as they waited patiently for seating to start and politely took their seats inside the auditorium. In all, more than 1,100 high school students and teachers from 24 public and private schools in Johnson, Wyandotte, Douglas and Leavenworth Counties in Kansas took part in this unique experience in civic education. Justice O’Connor later remarked: “I thought it went very well, and I was very impressed that we had a full auditorium of eager students there.”

Photo by Elizabeth Kuhlmann

A Torch Passing to a New Generation:  To help teachers and students get the most out of Justice O’Connor’s presentation, the Foundation enlisted the help of two experts on high school civics and the teaching of constitutional history to young students – Ken Thomas, government and Advanced Placement U.S. Government teacher, and We the People Coordinator, at Blue Valley Northwest High School, and Sara Hofeditz Christensen, a member of the 2014 graduating class at the University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Law.  The students “understood the legend who was sitting before them” and responded to Justice O’Connor’s message “that each of those students in the room could have significant impact on the world around them, especially in government,” Christensen told the UMKC Law School NewsSara Hofeditz Christensen (at left) is pictured here meeting with Justice Sandra Day O’Connor before the opening curtain on the November 12, 2013 presentation.  Christensen later noted how impressed she was at Justice O’Connor’s “genuine interest in what each of us was doing and how we had been involved in the program.”

Photo by Sherwood Archibald

Founders’ Circle:  The co-founders of the Johnson County First Amendment Foundation, J. Eugene Balloun (left) and U.S. Magistrate Judge David J. Waxse (right), meet with keynote speaker Justice Sandra Day O’Connor backstage before the November 12, 2013 “Conversation About the Constitution” at Yardley Hall.

Photo by Sherwood Archibald 

We The People: Gene Balloun presents Blue Valley Northwest teacher Ken Thomas with a donation to the Blue Valley Northwest We the People program, as Erin Braun, Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, and Sara Christensen look on. “We the People: The Citizen and the Constitution” is a program sponsored by the U.S. Department of Education and the Center for Civic Education and teaches students about the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. The Blue Valley program, which Mr. Thomas coordinates, has represented the State of Kansas in the national We the People competition in four of the last five years. In appreciation of the work that Mr. Thomas and Ms. Christensen performed in preparing the study guide for Justice O’Connor’s November 12 presentation to high school students, the Foundation was pleased to provide the Blue Valley Northwest We the People program with a modest donation following the close of Justice O’Connor’s presentation. The Foundation also made a donation to Justice O’Connor’s iCivics program at the conclusion of her presentation, which the law firm of Shook, Hardy & Bacon generously matched. Pictured, from left: Erin Braun, Director of Outreach for iCivics, Inc.; Sandra Day O’Connor, Associate Justice (ret.), United States Supreme Court; Ken S. Thomas, Member of the Advisory Committee of the Johnson County First Amendment Foundation and Teacher of Government and Advanced Placement U.S. Government, and We the People Coordinator, at Blue Valley Northwest High School; J. Eugene Balloun, co-founder of the Johnson County First Amendment Foundation and partner, Shook, Hardy & Bacon L.L.P.; and Sara Hofeditz Christensen, Foundation Program Planning Committee Member and Member of the 2014 Graduating Class at the University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Law.

Photo by Elizabeth Kuhlmann

Casual Conversation:  Members of the Johnson County First Amendment Foundation share a few lighthearted moments with Justice O’Connor and her party before addressing more than 1,100 high school students, teachers and guests from numerous counties in eastern Kansas.  Pictured here (from left) are:  Erin Braun, Director of Outreach for iCivics, Inc.; Sandra Day O’Connor, Associate Justice (ret.), United States Supreme Court (seated); Sara Hofeditz Christensen, member of the Foundation’s planning committee for the program, and member of the 2014 graduating class of the University of Missouri-Kansas City Law School (seated behind Justice O’Connor); J. Eugene Balloun, co-founder of the Johnson County First Amendment Foundation and partner, Shook, Hardy & Bacon L.L.P.; and Ken S. Thomas, member of the Foundation’s Advisory Committee and teacher of government and advanced placement U.S. government, and We the People Coordinator, at Blue Valley Northwest High School (standing at right, facing Justice O’Connor with back to the camera). 

Photo by Sherwood Archibald

Old Friends and Special Guests:  The mission of the Johnson County First Amendment Foundation is to promote a better understanding of the Constitution and constitutional principles by Kansas high school students.  The importance of this mission became evident in the early 1990s, when a local school district removed an award-winning book, Annie on My Mind by Nancy Garden, from school libraries because a district superintendent objected to the content of the book.  When several students brought a lawsuit challenging the district’s action, U.S. District Judge G. Thomas Van Bebber held that the district’s actions violated the students’ First Amendment rights under the federal constitution as well as their rights under the Kansas Constitution.  Judge Van Bebber observed that the school district had removed the book “because they disagreed with ideas expressed in the book” and that “[t]hrough their removal of the book, defendants intended to deny students . . . access to those ideas.”  The court awarded the students their attorney’s fees, and the principal attorneys for the students in that litigation – J. Eugene Balloun and David J. Waxse – and their law firm, Shook, Hardy & Bacon, L.L.P., donated those fees and additional funds to establish the Johnson County First Amendment Foundation in 1999.  Nearly 14 years after the Foundation was established, several of key participants in the First Amendment lawsuit joined the Foundation for Justice O’Connor’s “Conversation About the Constitution.”  Pictured here arriving for the November 13, 2013 program are (from left):  Jill Moore, member of the Foundation’s planning committee for the program, and Client/Alumni Relations Coordinator for Shook, Hardy & Bacon, L.L.P.; Nancy Garden, author of Annie on My Mind; Steve Case, father of one of the student plaintiffs in the First Amendment litigation; and Sandra Scott, attorney, and Ms. Garden’s spouse. 

Photo by Sherwood Archibald

Running Bases at 18th & Vine: (From left) Nancy Garden, award-winning author of Annie On My Mind and other books, and her partner, Sandra Scott, visit the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum in Kansas City, Missouri following Justice O’Connor’s “Conversation About the Constitution” with Kansas high school students.

Photo by Dr. Raymond Doswell, vice president of curatorial services for the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum, Inc., and courtesy of the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum

     

Holding Court: Students from St. Teresa’s Academy meet (from left, back row) Judge Duane Benton (Eighth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals), Heather A. Jones (President, Lawyers Association of Kansas City, Inc.; and Shareholder, Seigfreid Bingham, PC), and Justice Sandra Day O’Connor (Associate Justice (ret.), United States Supreme Court), following Justice O’Connor’s receipt of LAKC’s Charles Evans Whittaker Award on November 12, 2013.

Photo by Patrick Sirridge