On June 27, 2010, Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s husband, Martin, died of cancer. Objecting to the court’s majority opinion favoring Bush, Ginsburg deliberately and subtly concluded her decision with the words, “I dissent” a significant departure from the tradition of including the adverb “respectfully.” Gore, which effectively decided the 2000 presidential election between George W. Legacyĭespite her reputation for restrained writing, she gathered considerable attention for her dissenting opinion in the case of Bush v. In 1999, she won the American Bar Association’s Thurgood Marshall Award for her contributions to gender equality and civil rights. Virginia, which held that the state-supported Virginia Military Institute could not refuse to admit women. In 1996, Ginsburg wrote the Supreme Court’s landmark decision in United States v. In the end, she was easily confirmed by the Senate, 96-3. Ginsburg became the court's second female justice as well as the first Jewish female justice.Īs a judge, Ginsburg was considered part of the Supreme Court’s moderate-liberal bloc, presenting a strong voice in favor of gender equality, the rights of workers and the separation of church and state. Several expressed concern over how she could transition from social advocate to Supreme Court Justice. The Senate Judiciary Committee hearings were unusually friendly, despite frustration expressed by some senators over Ginsburg’s evasive answers to hypothetical situations. President Clinton wanted a replacement with the intellect and political skills to deal with the more conservative members of the Court. Supreme Court in 1993 by President Bill Clinton, selected to fill the seat vacated by Justice Byron White. She served there until she was appointed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. In 1980, President Jimmy Carter appointed Ruth Bader Ginsburg to the U.S.
One of the five cases she won before the Supreme Court involved a portion of the Social Security Act that favored women over men because it granted certain benefits to widows but not widowers. However, she also believed that the law was gender-blind and all groups were entitled to equal rights. Palmieri, she taught at Rutgers University Law School (1963-72) and at Columbia (1972-80), where she became the school’s first female tenured professor.ĭuring the 1970s, she also served as the director of the Women’s Rights Project of the American Civil Liberties Union ( ACLU), for which she argued six landmark cases on gender equality before the U.S. She graduated first in her class in 1959.ĭespite her outstanding academic record, however, Ginsburg continued to encounter gender discrimination while seeking employment after graduation. Martin recovered, graduated from law school, and accepted a position at a New York law firm. Ginsburg transferred to Columbia Law School in New York City to join her husband, where she was elected to the school’s law review.
Ginsburg attended to her young daughter and convalescing husband, taking notes for him in classes while she continued her own law studies. Then, another challenge: Martin contracted testicular cancer in 1956, requiring intensive treatment and rehabilitation. But Ginsburg pressed on and excelled academically, eventually becoming a member of the prestigious legal journal, the Harvard Law Review. The women were chided by the law school’s dean for taking the places of qualified males. She also encountered a very male-dominated, hostile environment, with only eight females in her class of 500. He served for two years and, after his discharge, the couple returned to Harvard where Ginsburg also enrolled.Īt Harvard, Ginsburg learned to balance life as a mother and her new role as a law student. The early years of their marriage were challenging, as their first child, Jane, was born shortly after Martin was drafted into the military in 1954. Ginsburg, also a law student, that same year.
Her mother struggled with cancer throughout Ginsburg’s high school years and died the day before Ginsburg’s graduation.īader graduated from Cornell University in 1954, finishing first in her class. At James Madison High School in Brooklyn, Ginsburg worked diligently and excelled in her studies. Ginsburg’s mother, a major influence in her life, taught her the value of independence and a good education.Ĭecelia herself did not attend college but instead worked in a garment factory to help pay for her brother’s college education, an act of selflessness that forever impressed Ginsburg. Ruth Joan Bader, the second daughter of Nathan and Cecelia Bader grew up in a low-income, working-class neighborhood in Brooklyn, New York.
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