Historical Meet-Ups

Sandra Day O’Connor
Trailblazing Supreme Court Justice

meets

John Riggins
Iconoclastic NFL running back

Bad things happen when you put a drunken football star and a judicial pioneer at the same table. Witness the kerfuffle that ensued at the Washington Press Club’s black-tie Salute to Congress dinner in 1985. Inexplicably, Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor was seated next to John Riggins, the hulking running back for the Washington Redskins. “Riggo,” or “The Diesel,” as he was popularly known, had a bit too much to drink that night and was soon sidling up to O’Connor with decidedly seamy intentions. “Come on, Sandy Baby, loosen up. You’re too tight,” he told her, and proceeded to pass out on the floor. According to newspaper reports, he lay there for several minutes while the wait staff served dessert to the mortified VIP diners.

To his credit, Riggins realized the error of his ways and sent roses to O’Connor the next morning by way of an apology. For her part, O’Connor was more amused than annoyed by the wasted pigskinner’s boorish come-on. She was soon outfitting her jazzercise classmates in t-shirts reading “Loosen up at the Supreme Court.” Several years later, after Riggins had retired from football and was trying to make a go of it as an actor on the D.C. theater circuit, O’Connor even showed up on opening night of one of his plays and gave him a dozen roses for his curtain call.