Ruth Bader Ginsburg

The Life and Legacy of Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Ruth Bader Ginsburg“ Fight for things you care about, but do it in a way that will lead others to join you.” - Ruth Bader Ginsburg

In the Jewish culture they leave stones instead of flowers to memorialize someone they have lost; unlike flowers, stones are immortal like the memory of their loved one. Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s memory will be immortal to the world: the Supreme Court Justice and crusader of women's rights will forever be a part of the United States history. Born on March 15,1933 in Brooklyn, New York, Ginsburg was born into adversity at the end of the Great Depression. Although Ginsburg was born into a time in which women had the freedom to vote, they had very little control over anything else. As a teen Ginsburg attended James Madison High School, and then went on to attend Cornell University earning high honors in government. In the Harvard Class of ‘59, nine of the five hundred students were women, Ginsburg being one of them, and even though she received backlash from the dean and fellow male students, she graduated law school at the top of her class. Amongst other things, Ginsburg was also editor for the Harvard Law Review. Afterwards, in 1960, she attended Columbia University to further her career in law, right at the start of the women’s rights movement.

In her lifetime Ginsburg worked tirelessly to bring equality to the sexes, and other groups facing aversion. For good reason too; after graduating law school Ginsburg was denied her clerkship, unlike her male counterparts, because of one judge's fear she might wear pants in court. While still fighting for her right to earn clerkship, Ginsburg took the position of Associate Director for Columbia Law School’s Project on International Procedure. With this opportunity Ginsburg wrote a book on Civil Procedure in Sweden, where 20% of law school graduates were women. She went on to then work as a professor for Rutgers Law School, where she once again faced gender discrimination and a wage gap compared to her male colleagues. She has accredited her strength numerous times to her late husband Martin D. Ginsburg, calling him her rock and biggest cheerleader. In 1972 Ginsburg co-founded the ACLU Women’s Rights Project, where she began to diligently work to overturn the five most prevalent cases discriminating against sex. Her work with the Women’s Rights Project led to the extension of the 14th amendment, giving women equal rights. She used cases surrounding the discrimination of men based on sex to further her point that discrimination affected all genders. Her work has made so many every day norms possible; before her work women were not allowed to cut a man's hair, buy a drink at the same legal age as a man, or receive the same social security benefits as a man. In 1980 President Jimmy Carter appointed Ginsburg to the Appellate Court, and thirteen years later President Bill Clinton appointed Ruth Bader Ginsburg to the Supreme Court where she served alongside Sandra Day O’Connor. Ruth Bader Ginsburg served on the US Supreme Court for 27 years before she passed, spending a great deal of time battling several forms of cancer, and surviving multiple times. Her legacy as an activist has made her the symbol of many movements, uplifting slogans, and a pop culture idol. Her nickname is truly fitting in times like these, “Notorious RBG” will go down in history for all she has done.