# Ruth Bader Ginsburg *American jurist; associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, 1993–2020* Ruth Bader Ginsburg (born Joan Ruth Bader; March 15, 1933 – September 18, 2020) sat as an associate justice of the [[Supreme Court of the United States]] from 1993 until she died in 2020.[^1][^2] President Bill Clinton named her to the seat left by the retirement of [[Byron White]]. When she was nominated, she was regarded as a moderate who built consensus.[^2] She was the Court's second woman, after [[Sandra Day O'Connor]], and its first Jewish woman.[^2] Before joining the bench, her career centered on litigation for gender equality and women's rights, and she won many arguments before the Supreme Court. She was a volunteer attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union. In the 1970s she also sat on its board of directors and was one of its general counsel.[^2] President Jimmy Carter appointed her in 1980 to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, where she sat until her elevation in 1993.[^2] On the Court she wrote majority opinions in cases including *United States v. Virginia* (1996). In her later years there, her dissents drew attention as expressions of liberal legal views, and she became a figure in popular culture.[^2] ## Early life and education She was born on March 15, 1933, at Beth Moses Hospital in Brooklyn. She was the second daughter of Celia (née Amster) and Nathan Bader, who lived in the Flatbush neighborhood. Her father had emigrated from Odesa, then part of the Russian Empire. Her mother was born in New York to Jewish parents from Kraków.[^3] The couple's elder daughter, Marylin, died of meningitis at six, when her younger sister was 14 months old. Several girls in her school class were also named Joan, so her teacher used her second name, Ruth.[^3] Celia had finished high school at 15, but her family paid for her brother's college education rather than hers. She encouraged her daughter's schooling.[^3] Ginsburg took her bachelor's degree at Cornell University and married Martin D. Ginsburg. She had a child before entering law school at Harvard, where few of her classmates were women. She then moved to Columbia Law School, finishing joint first in her class.[^2] ## Early career In 1960, Justice [[Felix Frankfurter]] turned Ginsburg down for a clerkship on account of her gender. He did so although Albert Martin Sacks, a Harvard Law School professor who later became its dean, had strongly recommended her.[^4] Columbia professor Gerald Gunther then pressed Judge Edmund L. Palmieri of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York to hire her. She clerked for Palmieri for two years beginning later in 1960.[^4] Between 1961 and 1963 she worked on the Columbia Law School Project on International Procedure under director Hans Smit. She served first as a research associate and then as associate director.[^4] She learned Swedish in order to write a book with Anders Bruzelius on civil procedure in Sweden, and she did research for it at Lund University. In Sweden, women made up 20 to 25 percent of law students.[^4] She went on to teach civil procedure at Rutgers Law School and Columbia Law School. At Columbia she was the first woman on the law faculty to receive tenure.[^2] ## U.S. Court of Appeals The Omnibus Judgeship Act of 1978 added 117 district judgeships and 35 circuit judgeships to the federal bench. It placed emphasis on including women and members of minority groups among the new judges.[^5] Ginsburg was interviewed by the Department of Justice for the post of Solicitor General. In January 1979 she completed questionnaires for possible seats on the Second Circuit and the D.C. Circuit.[^5] Carter nominated her on April 14, 1980, to the D.C. Circuit seat left vacant by the death of Judge Harold Leventhal. The [[United States Senate]] confirmed her on June 18, 1980, and she was commissioned the same day.[^5] ## Supreme Court ### Nomination and confirmation Clinton nominated Ginsburg on June 22, 1993. Attorney General Janet Reno had recommended her, following a suggestion from Utah Republican senator Orrin Hatch.[^6] The American Bar Association's Standing Committee on the Federal Judiciary gave her "well qualified", its highest rating for a prospective justice.[^6] Before the Senate Judiciary Committee she declined to state her views on the constitutionality of issues that might come before the Court, such as the death penalty. She did affirm her belief in a constitutional right to privacy.[^6] The Senate voted 96–3 to confirm her on August 3, 1993. She was commissioned on August 5 and took the judicial oath on August 10.[^6] ### Tenure She was the first Jewish justice to sit since [[Abe Fortas]] resigned in 1969, and she later became the longest-serving Jewish justice.[^6] Her majority opinions include *United States v. Virginia* (1996), *Olmstead v. L.C.* (1999), *Friends of the Earth, Inc. v. Laidlaw Environmental Services, Inc.* (2000) and *City of Sherrill v. Oneida Indian Nation of New York* (2005).[^2] O'Connor retired in 2006, and [[Sonia Sotomayor]] was appointed in 2009. In the years between, Ginsburg was the only woman on the Court.[^2] ## Other activities On January 20, 1997, at Vice President Al Gore's request, she administered his oath of office for a second term. She was the third woman to administer an inaugural oath.[^7] On August 31, 2013, she officiated at a same-sex wedding. She is believed to have been the first Supreme Court justice to do so.[^7] Supreme Court bar certificates formerly carried the words "in the year of our Lord". In 1993, Orthodox Jewish members of the bar who could not display them asked Ginsburg for help. After she objected, members were given several choices for how the year is inscribed.[^7] She regarded [[Antonin Scalia]] as her closest colleague on the Court despite their ideological differences. The two dined together and attended the opera, and she appeared in non-speaking roles in several operas.[^7] In January 2012 she spent four days in Egypt in discussions with judges, law faculty, law students and legal experts.[^7] ## Personal life Martin Ginsburg became an internationally prominent tax attorney at Weil, Gotshal & Manges. When she joined the D.C. Circuit, the couple moved from New York City to Washington, D.C., and he joined the law faculty of Georgetown University Law Center.[^8] Their daughter, Jane C. Ginsburg (born 1955), teaches at Columbia Law School. Their son, James Steven Ginsburg (born 1965), founded and heads Cedille Records, a classical recording company in Chicago.[^8] After their daughter's birth, Martin was diagnosed with testicular cancer. During his illness she attended class and took notes for both of them, and she was selected for the *Harvard Law Review*.[^8] Martin died of complications of metastatic cancer on June 27, 2010, four days after their 56th wedding anniversary.[^8] ## Death and succession Ginsburg died on September 18, 2020, aged 87, from complications of metastatic pancreatic cancer.[^9] Conditions during the [[COVID-19 pandemic]] prevented the usual lying in repose in the Court's great hall. Her casket was instead placed on the Court's west portico for two days of public viewing.[^9] She then lay in state at the Capitol, the first woman and the first Jew to do so. On September 29 she was buried beside her husband at Arlington National Cemetery.[^9] Her death opened a vacancy about six weeks before the 2020 presidential election. Days before she died, she had dictated a statement: "My most fervent wish is that I will not be replaced until a new president is installed."[^9] President Trump's nominee for the seat, [[Amy Coney Barrett]], was confirmed by the Senate and sworn in on October 26.[^9] ## Recognition She was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame in 2002.[^10] The Wikipedia article retrieved on 2026-10-26 lists honorary degrees from thirty institutions, from Lund University (1969) to the State University of New York (2019).[^10] In 2009 she received a Lifetime Achievement Award from Scribes—The American Society of Legal Writers.[^10] In 2013 the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery unveiled a painting of the four women who had served on the Court: Ginsburg, O'Connor, Sotomayor and [[Elena Kagan]].[^10] In 2018 she was the first recipient of the Genesis Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2019 she received the $1 million Berggruen Prize for Philosophy and Culture.[^10] ## In popular culture Her public profile grew after O'Connor's 2006 retirement left her the only woman serving on the Court. Her dissents, especially in *Shelby County v. Holder*, gave rise to the nickname "the Notorious R.B.G.", a play on the name of the rapper the Notorious B.I.G. The nickname spread from Tumblr as an internet meme.[^11] Law student Shana Knizhnik, who started the Tumblr blog, worked with MSNBC reporter Irin Carmon to turn it into the book *Notorious RBG: The Life and Times of Ruth Bader Ginsburg*. The book was published in October 2015 and became a [[New York Times]] bestseller.[^11] In 2016 the magazine *Current Affairs* questioned her standing as a progressive icon. It wrote that her voting record was more moderate than those of [[Thurgood Marshall]], [[William J. Brennan Jr.]] and [[William O. Douglas]]. It also wrote that she often sided with law enforcement in qualified immunity cases.[^11] Kate McKinnon has portrayed her on *Saturday Night Live* since 2015.[^11] ## Notes [^1]: Supreme Court Historical Society, *Ruth Bader Ginsburg* (undated) — associate-justice entry for her service, 1993–2020. https://supremecourthistory.org/associate-justices/ruth-bader-ginsburg-1993-2020/ [^2]: Wikipedia, *Ruth Bader Ginsburg* (rev. 1380703602, retrieved 2026-10-26), lead section — dates, nomination, ACLU work, D.C. Circuit appointment, education, majority opinions, sole female justice 2006–2009. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Bader_Ginsburg [^3]: Wikipedia, *Ruth Bader Ginsburg* (rev. 1380703602, retrieved 2026-10-26), "Early life and education" — birth, parents, sister's death, name, mother's schooling. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Bader_Ginsburg [^4]: Wikipedia, *Ruth Bader Ginsburg* (rev. 1380703602, retrieved 2026-10-26), "Early career" — Frankfurter rejection, Palmieri clerkship, Columbia project 1961–1963, Swedish research. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Bader_Ginsburg [^5]: Wikipedia, *Ruth Bader Ginsburg* (rev. 1380703602, retrieved 2026-10-26), "U.S. Court of Appeals" — Omnibus Judgeship Act of 1978; nomination April 14, 1980; confirmation and commission June 18, 1980. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Bader_Ginsburg [^6]: Wikipedia, *Ruth Bader Ginsburg* (rev. 1380703602, retrieved 2026-10-26), "Supreme Court" — nomination June 22, 1993; ABA rating; hearings; 96–3 vote August 3, 1993; commission and oath. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Bader_Ginsburg [^7]: Wikipedia, *Ruth Bader Ginsburg* (rev. 1380703602, retrieved 2026-10-26), "Other activities" — 1997 oath, 2013 wedding, bar certificates, Scalia, Egypt 2012. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Bader_Ginsburg [^8]: Wikipedia, *Ruth Bader Ginsburg* (rev. 1380703602, retrieved 2026-10-26), "Personal life" — husband, children, Harvard years, Martin's death June 27, 2010. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Bader_Ginsburg [^9]: Wikipedia, *Ruth Bader Ginsburg* (rev. 1380703602, retrieved 2026-10-26), "Death and succession" — death September 18, 2020; repose and lying in state; burial September 29; dictated statement; Barrett's confirmation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Bader_Ginsburg [^10]: Wikipedia, *Ruth Bader Ginsburg* (rev. 1380703602, retrieved 2026-10-26), "Recognition" — Hall of Fame 2002, honorary degrees, Scribes 2009, portrait 2013, Genesis 2018, Berggruen Prize 2019. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Bader_Ginsburg [^11]: Wikipedia, *Ruth Bader Ginsburg* (rev. 1380703602, retrieved 2026-10-26), "In popular culture" — nickname, 2015 book, *Current Affairs* critique 2016, *Saturday Night Live*. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Bader_Ginsburg