“The Notorious RBG”: An Understanding of the Late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg’s Life and Impact

“The Notorious RBG” may sound like nothing more than a rip-off of the late American rapper Biggie’s stage name, but former Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s life and work have left the light on for countless coming generations. When Ginsburg died on September 18, 2020, the internet was flooded with countless mourning posts, many of which may have faded from feeds by now. Who was “The Notorious RBG”, and why do we remember her?

There aren’t a lot of people whose obituaries mention “trailblazing justice” alongside “pop culture icon” and “has a praying mantis named after her”, but Ginsburg is one of them. 

Overall, Ginsburg was an inspiration to many because of the way she faced and overcame obstacles in her life. Born in Brooklyn to immigrant parents without college degrees, Ginsburg went on to attend Cornell University at a time when only 5% of women of 20-24 years old were enrolled in school. She graduated in 1954 with top grades, then took a break for two years as she got married and had her first child. Two years later, she was accepted into Harvard Law School.

Admission into Harvard Law School was not the sudden highway into success that many of us would imagine. At Harvard, Ginsburg was one of nine women studying alongside more than 500 men. Upon inviting these nine women to dinner, a member of the faculty asked them: “How do you justify taking a spot from a qualified man?” Ginsburg’s answer was more of a deflection than self-defense, as, unlike many modern-day stories of activists and politicians, Ginsburg was not in law to fight for the noble goal of equality. Despite the fact that she was simply there out of self-interest, she faced countless similar micro-aggressions throughout her time at school and beyond.

At Harvard, Ginsburg was studying, serving on the prestigious Harvard Law Review, caring for her newborn, and caring after her husband Martin Ginsburg as he suffered from cancer, all at the same time. In order to ensure Martin wouldn’t fall behind in classes as he battled cancer, Ginsburg also attended lectures, took notes and wrote papers for him on top of her own schoolwork.

To keep her family together when Martin eventually graduated and was hired to work in New York, Ginsburg transferred to Columbia Law School, where she continued to do well as she worked towards her law degree. By the time she graduated, Ginsburg had made law review in both Harvard and Columbia, an achievement rare for both men and women of her time. 

Ginsburg graduated tying for first in her class. However, she found that no law firms were willing to hire her because she was a woman. Denied by both the private sector and the upper-echelons of the public sector (see paragraph 6 of ACLU’s article), Ginsburg chose to clerk for the U.S. District Court in New York.

After this job, Ginsburg turned to the academia. She self-studied Swedish to participate in Columbia Law School’s International Procedure Project, where she translated Swedish laws and co-authored a book about the Swedish legal system.

Ginsburg then worked as a professor at Rutgers Law School for almost a decade. At Rutgers, upon realizing that her salary was lower than that of male professors, she called upon and led other female members of the faculty to stand up for themselves, resulting in pay raises for the women involved.

In 1972, Ginsburg moved to Columbia University, becoming the university’s first tenured female law professor as she started her campaign for equality before the law. This was only one of the many “first”s she became throughout the course of her life.

When reflecting on Ginsburg’s life, high school Biology and Science teacher Ms. Maine reminds us that it’s important to remember the context: while Ms. Maine herself can remember the passing of the Equal Rights Amendment from her childhood, Ginsburg was born in 1933, 5 years before the US established minimum wage for workers of all sexes. Before the mid-1970s, married women couldn’t get (and single women were often denied) credit cards under their own name, forcing them into financial dependence on their spouse or family. 

As she inspired with her resilience in spite of the odds stacked against her, Ginsburg also paved the legal way for many others to walk their own paths. Throughout her career, in addition to helping women gain credit rights, Ginsburg also fought for and won cases for disability rights, workplace rights and voting rights.

Although she was initially rejected from law firms, she returned to court in the 1970s as a volunteer attorney of the Women’s Rights Project at the American Civil Liberties Union—a project which she co-founded in 1972 to fight for and defend women’s rights in the courtroom.  

Ginsburg was a successful attorney, winning five out of six cases which she argued before the Supreme Court within three years. In 1980, she was nominated to the U.S. Court of Appeals by President Jimmy Carter. She served on the Court of Appeals until her appointment to the U.S. Supreme Court of Justice in 1993. When she was confirmed, Ginsburg was the second woman and first Jewish woman to serve as Associate Justice on the Supreme Court.

As explained in On the Basis of Sex, a movie about Ginsburg’s life and the Moritz v. Commissioner case, here was Ginsburg’s career challenge:

“We’re not asking you to change the country. That’s already happened without any court’s permission. We’re asking you to protect the right of the country to change.”

While she could’ve chosen to stick to the standard “advise clients” and “draw up legal documents” aspects of an attorney’s job description, she chose instead to read the situation above and take on the task of steering the American justice system towards protecting equality. Two major tactics she used throughout her career can be seen in these two of her many notable cases:

(1) 1972, Moritz v. Commissioner

In this case, Ginsburg represented the unmarried Charles Moritz at the Court of Appeals after his local court had denied him a caretaker’s tax deduction for taking care of his elderly mother, despite the fact that a woman in his place would’ve received such a deduction. Although Reed v. Reed (where Ginsburg co-wrote Sally Reed’s winning brief) was Ginsburg’s earliest gender equality case, Moritz v. Commissionerwas the first out of many Ginsburg cases where she convinced the court that gender equality could bring positive change to all genders, not just women. By winning this case, Ginsburg showed that certain Denver laws (which were reflected across the country) were unconstitutional and needed change to reflect the gender equality.

(2) 2006, Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. Inc.

In this case, Lily Ledbetter was suing her employer for underpaying her in comparison to her male co-workers, and appealing her case before the Supreme Court. Although Ginsburg’s vote for Ledbetter was on the dissenting side (not the winning majority), her actions following the case brought about major change. Instead of only filing her dissenting opinion with clerks as per procedure, Ginsburg rewrote her dissent in colloquial language instead of formal legal language and read it out loud from the bench. In her dissent, Ginsburg explicitly reached out to Congress, calling for change in legislation to prevent further Ledbetter cases, bringing attention to a small, previously obscure case. Three years later, the first bill that the President Barack Obama signed was the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009.

In addition to her wins in court and the formation of the ACLU’s Women’s Rights Project mentioned above, Ginsburg also helped found the Women’s Rights Law Reporter—the first “legal periodical in United States focusing exclusively on the field of women’s rights law”— in 1970 and created the first textbook on gender discrimination. In a time when law related to women’s rights was considered an unimportant and “frivolous” focus, Ginsburg’s work brought attention and urgency to gender discrimination issues. As she progressed through her career, Ginsburg also dealt with more cases about civil rights issues unrelated to gender, such as disabilities, voting rights, and environmental accountability. 

Overall, Ginsburg was not flashy about her accomplishments: Ms. Maine grew up as Ginsburg was beginning to work and make changes in the 1960s but recalls that she didn’t know of Ginsburg’s impact until the 80s. 

Being human, despite winning groundbreaking victories for so many struggling people, Ginsburg was not a perfect person, nor the single perfect embodiment of equality and lack of bias. 

Ginsburg lived through a time of social change, where people unprotected by the law were fighting for acknowledgement in society. Ginsburg played an irrefutably important role in ensuring that change happened in American law as well. 

As we look back on her life and then turn to look ahead, let us whole-heartedly celebrate and uphold her victories without blind idolization. 

May her memory be a blessing.