"U.S Supreme court judge Ruth Bader Ginsburg, champion of the Court, gender rights, and hearts of the American people, died on September 18th of 2020 at age 87."--Zorah Cohen, 11th grade
U.S Supreme court judge Ruth Bader Ginsburg, champion of the Court, gender rights, and hearts of the American people, died on September 18th of 2020 at age 87. To lose such a beloved member of the American government is like twisting the dagger inside of the already wounded public. In the plague of never ending news, each more hair pulling than the last, it is easy to want to reflect on the seemingly bleak future and not the full 87 years of life lived.
Ginsburg was born Jean Ruth Bader on March 15, 1933, in Brooklyn, New York to Celia and Nathan Bader. Ginsberg graduated from James Madison High School in 1950 at age 15. She went on to attend Columbia Law School, Cornell University, where she graduated top of her class, and Harvard Law, where she graduated as one of the 9 women of her class. She was the first woman to be a member of the prestigious Harvard Law Review.
Ginsburg was born Jean Ruth Bader on March 15, 1933, in Brooklyn, New York to Celia and Nathan Bader. Ginsberg graduated from James Madison High School in 1950 at age 15. She went on to attend Columbia Law School, Cornell University, where she graduated top of her class, and Harvard Law, where she graduated as one of the 9 women of her class. She was the first woman to be a member of the prestigious Harvard Law Review.
Nina Totenberg of NPR remembers her friendship with Ginsberg fondly, reflecting on her kindness and commitment to those around her. In an article written by Totenberg a day after Ginsberg's death, she wrote, “I began to truly understand the measure of the woman when my husband, Floyd Haskell, fell on the ice and spent much of the next four years, in the hospital, struggling to recover. By then, Ruth was a Supreme Court justice, but periodically, she and her husband, Marty, would scoop me up, taking me with them for a night out, or dinner at their apartment with someone interesting… I always felt those evenings as a kind of embrace.”
Another story that stands out is Totenberg’s recalling of a conference in New York where they met in person for the first time, after cultivating a friendship over the phone. “We never did agree what the subject of that conference was, but take my word for it, it was boring. So boring that we ... well, we went shopping.” These stories of small and big sweetnesses are ones that fully round off Ginsberg in my mind, as being a champion of not just the general public, but of those she loved.
For Ginsberg, her inspiration for change in America developed in 1962, when she lived in Sweden for a legal research project. It was there where she witnessed a 7-month pregnant woman preside as judge over a trial—an impossibility in 1960s America—as well as at least 25% of law students being women. The cultural difference when it came to women's rights in Sweden was a wake up call for Ginsberg, who struggled to find a job after graduating from Harvard Law School. “My thought processes were stimulated in Sweden,” Ginsberg said in an interview with Ulrika Modéer, Assistant Secretary General and Director of Bureau of External Relations and Advocacy, following the university ceremony. “I saw what was wrong and what needed to change in the U.S.A.”
It was in Sweden that Ginsberg met Sherri Finkbine, a woman from Arizona who had travelled to Sweden to get an abortion, something inaccessible in her home state. She had taken Thalidomide, a substance that used to be prescribed to pregnant women to relieve nausea that was later found to cause severe birth defects, and is known as the Thalidomide tragedy. Her fetus was at risk of being terribly deformed. It was experiences like these that guided her work on Women's Rights, and to eventually become the feminist icon we all knew and love. “My eyes were opened,” said Ginsberg on this experience in an interview with Lynn Hecht Schafran at the VFA Salute to Feminist Lawyers event in 2008.
Another story that stands out is Totenberg’s recalling of a conference in New York where they met in person for the first time, after cultivating a friendship over the phone. “We never did agree what the subject of that conference was, but take my word for it, it was boring. So boring that we ... well, we went shopping.” These stories of small and big sweetnesses are ones that fully round off Ginsberg in my mind, as being a champion of not just the general public, but of those she loved.
For Ginsberg, her inspiration for change in America developed in 1962, when she lived in Sweden for a legal research project. It was there where she witnessed a 7-month pregnant woman preside as judge over a trial—an impossibility in 1960s America—as well as at least 25% of law students being women. The cultural difference when it came to women's rights in Sweden was a wake up call for Ginsberg, who struggled to find a job after graduating from Harvard Law School. “My thought processes were stimulated in Sweden,” Ginsberg said in an interview with Ulrika Modéer, Assistant Secretary General and Director of Bureau of External Relations and Advocacy, following the university ceremony. “I saw what was wrong and what needed to change in the U.S.A.”
It was in Sweden that Ginsberg met Sherri Finkbine, a woman from Arizona who had travelled to Sweden to get an abortion, something inaccessible in her home state. She had taken Thalidomide, a substance that used to be prescribed to pregnant women to relieve nausea that was later found to cause severe birth defects, and is known as the Thalidomide tragedy. Her fetus was at risk of being terribly deformed. It was experiences like these that guided her work on Women's Rights, and to eventually become the feminist icon we all knew and love. “My eyes were opened,” said Ginsberg on this experience in an interview with Lynn Hecht Schafran at the VFA Salute to Feminist Lawyers event in 2008.
Despite her strong association with the Reed v. Reed case, which took place 9 years before her appointment to the Supreme Court, Ginsberg wasn't actually the one to argue it. She did however write the brief (written documents in which the attorneys in a case present their legal arguments to the court). In that same interview with Schafran at the VFA Salute to Feminist Lawyers event in 2008, Ginsburg said “[I] was just amazed and delighted to see that in Justice Brennan’s opinion, he lifted all passages of that brief and put it in the court’s opinion… There’s no higher compliment that a lawyer can have then a brief shows up in the court’s opinion.” It was this case that stated discrimination based on gender is not constitutional when naming the administrator of an estate, and began Ginsberg’s reputation as champion of gender rights.
When Ginsberg became the second woman to ever be appointed to the Supreme Court in April of 1980, she went on to argue six cases before the Supreme Court, winning five and writing a large number of briefs or certiorari petitions (a petition that argues a lower court has incorrectly decided an important question of law) in almost every women’s rights case presented.
Ginsberg is the first woman and Jewish citizen to be laid in state at the United States Capitol, an honored distinction shared by Eisenhower, Kennedy, Hoover, and many more. She is survived by her two children, Jane Carol Ginsburg and James Steven Ginsburg, her four grandchildren, Paul Spera, Clara Spera , Miranda Ginsburg, Abigail Ginsburg, two step-grandchildren, Harjinder Bedi, Satinder Bedi, and one great-grandchild, Lucrezia Spera. She was buried in a private ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery alongside her late husband, Marty, who she met on a blind date in college, and stayed with until his death in 2010.
When Ginsberg became the second woman to ever be appointed to the Supreme Court in April of 1980, she went on to argue six cases before the Supreme Court, winning five and writing a large number of briefs or certiorari petitions (a petition that argues a lower court has incorrectly decided an important question of law) in almost every women’s rights case presented.
Ginsberg is the first woman and Jewish citizen to be laid in state at the United States Capitol, an honored distinction shared by Eisenhower, Kennedy, Hoover, and many more. She is survived by her two children, Jane Carol Ginsburg and James Steven Ginsburg, her four grandchildren, Paul Spera, Clara Spera , Miranda Ginsburg, Abigail Ginsburg, two step-grandchildren, Harjinder Bedi, Satinder Bedi, and one great-grandchild, Lucrezia Spera. She was buried in a private ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery alongside her late husband, Marty, who she met on a blind date in college, and stayed with until his death in 2010.