Ruth Bader Ginsburg

Ruth Bader Ginsburg:

Biography by Annabel Lee

March 30, 2017

INTRODUCTION

“Fight for the things that you care about. But do it in a way that will lead others to join you.” - Ruth Bader Ginsburg

In the 1940s through the 1960s women were expected to marry, become mothers, and keep house, definitely not go to college and become lawyers. They were expected to cook and clean, while the men worked. They weren’t expected to do anything really. But one woman didn’t listen to or follow that stereotype. She fought for the things she cared about, and empowered many others by doing so. She was a mother, a lawyer, and later, as we know her, she became a supreme court justice. Her name is Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

WHO IS RUTH BADER GINSBURG?

The second daughter of Nathan and Celia Bader, Ruth Bader Ginsburg fights for equal rights in the supreme court. She is most known for her collars or jabots, being the first Jewish woman, and the second woman on the supreme court. She juggled life working and being a mother, in a time where women, especially mothers, were not encouraged to work. Ginsburg is determined, strong, powerful, and confident in her work and daily life. Her confidence and determination has lead her this far and is an inspiration to all. But Ginsburg did not always want to be a judge. She originally wanted to be a lawyer but ended up on a different end of law. Ginsburg was always ambitious and so it isn’t surprising that she went farther than she ever thought she could. This is Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a strong important leader.

EARLY LIFE

Ruth Bader Ginsburg was born Ruth Joan Bader on March 15, 1933 in Brooklyn, New York. She was nicknamed Kiki by her older sister, Marilyn, who died of meningitis at an early age. At a young age, Ginsburg noticed the discrimination against women, and Jewish religion. As a Jewish woman herself, Ginsburg faced many obstacles throughout her life. Ginsburg attended James Madison High School in Brooklyn where she graduated at the top of her class. Sadly, her mother suffered cancer, and died the day before Ginsburg’s graduation. As a child, Ginsburg loved music, and books. When she was in high school, Ginsburg went to a Jewish summer camp called Camp Che-Na-Wah in New York.

Ginsburg attended Cornell University in 1954, where she earned her bachelor’s degree in government. While at Cornell, Ginsburg met Martin D. Ginsburg. They married June of 1954, after Ginsburg graduated from Cornell. Martin was drafted for military duty, and shortly after, they had a daughter, Jane Carol Ginsburg on July 21, 1955. Martin served from 1954 to 1956, and when he returned, Ginsburg enrolled in Harvard Law School in Columbia, Massachusetts.

At Harvard, Ginsburg was one of nine women, and five hundred men in her class. According to the dean of Harvard Law school, the women were taking away spots from “qualified men”. Although she excelled in her studies at Harvard, Martin had been offered a job in New York City. So Ginsburg switched to Columbia University School of Law in 1958. She graduated from Columbia University School of Law in 1959.

CAREER

After graduating from Columbia, Ginsburg looked for a job. She was recommended to be a law clerk for Supreme Court justice Felix Frankfurter, by one of her professors. But Frankfurter said that he wasn’t ready to hire a woman. Finally, Ginsburg got a job as a clerk for U. S. district judge Edmund L. Palmieri. She worked for him from 1959 to 1961.

After working for judge Edmund L. Palmieri, Ginsburg joined Columbia’s Project on International Civil Procedure. As part of the project, Ginsburg learned Swedish and briefly worked in Sweden. Afterwards, Ginsburg became the first female tenured professor at Rutgers University Law School in New Jersey in 1963. In 1965, Ginsburg published her first book, Civil Procedure in Sweden with Anders Bruzelius. On September 8, 1965, James Steven Ginsburg, the Ginsburg's second child, was born.

Around the same time, Ginsburg started her work on women’s rights. She worked as an attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), while continuing her work as a professor at Rutgers. In the spring of 1972, Ginsburg was named cofounder of the Women’s Rights Project that the ACLU created.

On April 11, 1980, Ginsburg was nominated by President Jimmy Carter to the United States Court of Appeals for the district of columbia. She worked there until she was nominated to be an Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court by President Bill Clinton on July 14, 1993, after Justice Byron White retired.

In 1999 Ginsburg was awarded the American Bar Association's Thurgood Marshall Award for her work in women’s rights, and civil rights. That year she was also diagnosed with colorectal cancer. In 2009 Ginsburg had surgery to remove a cancerous tumor, and a year later, on June 27, 2010, Ginsburg’s beloved husband, Martin Ginsburg died from metastatic cancer.

In the next few years, President Barack Obama nominated, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, two women, to the supreme court. In August 2013, Ruth Bader Ginsburg became the first supreme court justice to officiate a same-sex wedding.

Ginsburg exercises at the gym daily, and loves opera. She is a terrible cook, although Martin was a magnificent chef. Some say the Ginsburg is too old to be a supreme court justice, and that she should retire, but not Ruth Ginsburg. She continues to be a supreme court justice, wear her jabots, and dissent, when she does not agree, like she has done for many years.

ACCOMPLISHMENTS

Ruth Bader Ginsburg was a women’s rights activist, a mother, the first Jewish woman on the supreme court, and is an Associate Justice for the Supreme Court of the United States, and she did it all in a time where women were not encouraged to be anything but mothers and wives. But Ruth Bader Ginsburg didn’t let those barriers stop her, no, she just kept on fighting for what she believed in, in a way that led others to follow her. Ginsburg is confident and inspiring. She is prepared to stretch the limits and fight for what is right, one ruling at a time.

Bibliography

1. Biography.com. “Ruth Bader Ginsburg-Supreme Court Justice.” Biography.com. 2017. Web. 21 March 2017

<http://www.biography.com/people/ruth-bader-ginsburg-9312041>

2. Carmon, Irin and Knizhniz, Shana. Notorious RBG. Broadway, New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 2015. Print.

3. Levy, Debbie. I Dissent:Ruth Bader Ginsburg makes her mark. New York, 2016. Print.

4. Roland, James. Ruth Bader Ginsburg:iconic Supreme Court justice. Minneapolis, Minnesota: Lerner Publications, 2016. Print.