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I Am A Judge Born, Raised, And Proud Of Being A Jew. The Demand For Justice Runs Through The Entirety Of The Jewish Tradition. I Hope, In My Years On The Bench Of The Supreme Court Of The United States, I Will Have The Strength And The Courage To Remain Constant In The Service Of That Demand.

-Ruth Bader Ginsburg

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I Am A Judge

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

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I Am A Judge Born, Raised, And Proud Of Being A Jew. The Demand For Justice Runs Through The Entirety Of The Jewish Tradition. I Hope, In My Years On The Bench Of The Supreme Court Of The United States, I Will Have The Strength And The Courage To Remain Constant In The Service Of That Demand.

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Jewish Tradition

More From Ruth Bader Ginsburg

Work For The Things That You Care About.

Neither Federal Nor State Government Acts Compatibly With Equal Protection When A Law Or Official Policy Denies To Women, Simply Because They Are Women, Full Citizenship Stature - Equal Opportunity To Aspire, Achieve, Participate In And Contribute To Society Based On Their Individual Talents And Capacities.

Whatever Community Organization, Whether It's A Women's Organization, Or Fighting For Racial Justice ... You Will Get Satisfaction Out Of Doing Something To Give Back To The Community That You Never Get In Any Other Way.

My Dissenting Opinions, Like My Briefs, Are Intended To Persuade. And Sometimes One Must Be Forceful About Saying How Wrong The Court's Decision Is.

Generalizations About The "way Women Are" And Estimates Of What Is Appropriate For Most Women No Longer Justify Denying Opportunity To Women Whose Talent And Capacity Place Them Outside The Average Description.

Prisons Should Be Co-ed Because Separate Quarters Are Discriminatory.

I Am A Judge Born, Raised, And Proud Of Being A Jew. The Demand For Justice Runs Through The Entirety Of The Jewish Tradition. I Hope, In My Years On The Bench Of The Supreme Court Of The United States, I Will Have The Strength And The Courage To Remain Constant In The Service Of That Demand.

Jewish Tradition

A Prime Part Of The History Of Our Constitution Is The Story Of The Extension Of Constitutional Rights To People Once Ignored Or Excluded.

If There Was One Decision I Would Overrule, It Would Be Citizens United. I Think The Notion That We Have All The Democracy That Money Can Buy Strays So Far From What Our Democracy Is Supposed To Be.

We Should Learn ... To Do Our Best For The Sake Of Our Communities And For The Sake Of Those For Whom We Pave The Way.

There Is A Constitutional Right To Prostitution.

Dissents Speak To A Future Age. It's Not Simply To Say, 'my Colleagues Are Wrong And I Would Do It This Way.' But The Greatest Dissents Do Become Court Opinions And Gradually Over Time Their Views Become The Dominant View. So That's The Dissenter's Hope: That They Are Writing Not For Today But For Tomorrow.

Freedom Of Speech

My Rule Was I Will Not Answer A Question That Attempts To Project How I Will Rule In A Case That Might Come Before The Court.

My Mother Told Me To Be A Lady. And For Her, That Meant Be Your Own Person, Be Independent.

In Most Civil Law Systems There Are No Dissents. There Is A Single Opinion For The Court: It Is Unanimous; It Is Highly Stylized; You Can't Tell Which Judge Wrote It.

In Sum, The Court's Conclusion That A Constitutionally Adequate Recount Is Impractical Is A Prophecy The Court's Own Judgment Will Not Allow To Be Tested. Such An Untested Prophecy Should Not Decide The Presidency Of The United States.

Racial Discrimination In Elections In Texas Is No Mere Historical Artifact. To The Contrary, Texas Has Been Found In Violation Of The Voting Rights Act In Every Redistricting Cycle From And After 1970.

The Impact Of All These Restrictions Is On Poor Women, Because Women Who Have Means, If Their State Doesn't Provide Access, Another State Does. ... It Makes No Sense As A National Policy To Promote Birth Only Among Poor People.

People Who Are Well Represented At Trial Do Not Get The Death Penalty.

Religious Organizations Exist To Foster The Interests Of Persons Subscribing To The Same Religious Faith. Not So Of For-profit Corporations. Workers Who Sustain The Operations Of Those Corporations Commonly Are Not Drawn From One Religious Community.

You're Saying, No, State Said Two Kinds Of Marriage; The Full Marriage, And Then This Sort Of Skim-milk Marriage.

I Do Think That Being The Second [female Supreme Court Justice] Is Wonderful, Because It Is A Sign That Being A Woman In A Place Of Importance Is No Longer Extraordinary.

Anger, Resentment, Envy, And Self-pity Are Wasteful Reactions. They Greatly Drain One's Time. They Sap Energy Better Devoted To Productive Endeavors.

I Would Not Look To The United States Constitution If I Were Drafting A Constitution In The Year 2012.

I Became A Lawyer For Selfish Reasons. I Thought I Could Do A Lawyer’s Job Better Than Any Other.

I'm Not Very Good At Promotion.

You Would Have A Huge Statelessness Problem If You Don't Consider A Child Born Abroad A U.s. Citizen.

If I Resign Any Time This Year, He [president Obama] Could Not Successfully Appoint Anyone I Would Like To See In The Court. ... [a]nybody Who Thinks That If I Step Down, Obama Could Appoint Someone Like Me, They're Misguided.

The Written Argument Endures. The Oral Argument Is Fleeting.

Members Of The Legislature, People Who Have Run For Office, Know The Connection Between Money And Influence On What Laws Get Passed

Every Constitution Written Since The End Of World War Ii Includes A Provision That Men And Women Are Citizens Of Equal Stature. Ours Does Not.

I Do Hope That Some Of My Dissents Will One Day Be The Law.

Sometimes People Say Unkind Or Thoughtless Things, And When They Do, It Is Best To Be A Little Hard Of Hearing — To Tune Out And Not Snap Back In Anger Or Impatience.

I Said On The Equality Side Of It, That It Is Essential To A Woman's Equality With Man That She Be The Decision-maker, That Her Choice Be Controlling.

In My View, If The Court Had Properly Interpreted The Second Amendment, The Court Would Have Said That Amendment Was Very Important When The Nation Was New, It Gave A Qualified Right To Keep And Bear Arms But It Was For One Purpose Only, And That Was The Purpose Of Having Militiamen Who Were Able To Fight To Preserve The Nation.

I Conceived Of Myself In Large Part As A Teacher. There Wasn't A Great Understanding Of Gender Discrimination. People Knew That Race Discrimination Was An Odious Thing, But There Were Many Who Thought That All The Gender-based Differentials In The Law Operated Benignly In Women's Favor. So My Objective Was To Take The Court Step By Step To The Realization, In Justice Brennan's Words, That The Pedestal On Which Some Thought Women Were Standing All Too Often Turned Out To Be A Cage.

The State Controlling A Woman Would Mean Denying Her Full Autonomy And Full Equality.

One Might Plausibly Contend That Congress Violates The Spirit, If Not The Letter, Of The Constitutional Doctrine Of Separation Of Powers When It Exonerates Itself From The Impositions Of The Laws It Obligates People Outside The Legislature To Obey.

There Are Some Singers That Know Exactly When To Go, And Others Hang On Much Too Long And That Is The Same, That Is The Same With Judges.

My Own View, And I've Said This Many Times, Is As Long As I Can Do The Work Full Steam, I Will Stay On The Court. But When I Feel Myself Slipping, When I Slow Down In My Ability To Write Opinions With Fair Dispatch, When I Forget The Names Of Cases That I Once Could Recite At The Drop Of A Hat, I Will Know It Is Time For Me To Go.

You Can't Have It All, All At Once. Who—man Or Woman—has It All, All At Once? Over My Lifespan I Think I Have Had It All. But In Different Periods Of Time Things Were Rough. And If You Have A Caring Life Partner, You Help The Other Person When That Person Needs It.

Our Goal In The '70s Was To End The Closed Door Era. There Were So Many Things That Were Off Limits To Women, Policing, Firefighting, Mining, Piloting Planes. And The Stereotypical View Of People Of A World Divided Between Home And Child Caring Women And Men As Breadwinners, Men Representing The Family Outside The Home.

I Think Members Of The Legislature, People Who Have To Run For Office, Know The Connection Between Money And Influence On What Laws Get Passed.

It Is Not Like I Have Gone Crazy, I Just Don't Want To Take Any Chances. You Never Know What Could Happen.

Adult Women Are Able To Make Decisions About Their Own Lives' Course No Less Than Men Are.

When I Graduated From Law School In 1959, There Wasn't A Single Woman On Any Federal Bench. It Wouldn't Be A Realistic Ambition For A Woman To Want To Become A Federal Judge.

Approving Some Religious Claims While Deeming Others Unworthy Of Accommodation Could Be 'perceived As Favoring One Religion Over Another,' The Very 'risk The [constitution's] Establishment Clause Was Designed To Preclude.

Establishment Clause

The Greatest Threat To Public Confidence In Elections In This Case Is The Prospect Of Enforcing A Purposefully Discriminatory Law, One That Likely Imposes An Unconstitutional Poll Tax And Risks Denying The Right To Vote To Hundreds Of Thousands Of Eligible Voters.

Reading Is The Key That Opens Doors To Many Good Things In Life. Reading Shaped My Dreams, And More Reading Helped Me Make My Dreams Come True.

If You Ask Judges, Do You Always Agree On Everything? Of Course Not, We Divide Just As You Do. Why Aren't You Transparent About It? Because The People Would Begin To Think That The Law Is Not Stable, The Law Is Unclear. And That Would Not Give Them Much Faith In The Law.

The Second Amendment Has A Preamble About The Need For A Militia. Because There Is A Need For A Militia To Be At The Ready, Therefore The Right To Keep And Bear Arms Must Be Secured.

Second Amendment

..the United States Is Subject To The Scrutiny Of A Candid World ... What The United States Does, For Good Or For Ill, Continues To Be Watched By The International Community, In Particular By Organizations Concerned With The Advancement Of The Rule Of Law And Respect For Human Dignity.

So That's The Dissenter's Hope: That They Are Writing Not For Today But For Tomorrow.

Freedom Of Speech

No One Who Is In Business For Profit Can Foist His Or Her Beliefs On A Workforce That Includes Many People Who Do Not Share Those Beliefs.

People Who Have Been Hardworking, Tax Paying, Those People Ought To Be Given An Opportunity To Be On A Track That Leads Towards Citizenship And If That Happened, Then They Wouldn't Be Prey To The Employers Who Say We Want You Because We Know That You Work For A Salary We Could Not Lawfully Pay Anyone Else.

The Second Amendment Is Outdated In The Sense That Its Function Has Become Obsolete.

Second Amendment

...the Court ...[recognizes]...the Persistence Of Racial Inequality And A Majority's Acknowledgement Of Congress's Authority To Act Affirmatively, Not Only To End Discrimination, But Also To Counteract Discrimination's Lingering Effects. Those Effects, Reflective Of A System Of Racial Caste [legal Segregation And Discrimination] Only Recently Ended, Are Evident In Our Work Places, Markets, And Neighborhoods. Job Applicants With Identical Resumes, Qualifications, And Interview Styles Still Experience Different Receptions, Depending On Their Race.

So Now The Perception Is, Yes, Women Are Here To Stay. And When I'm Sometimes Asked When Will There Be Enough [women On The Supreme Court]? And I Say When There Are Nine, People Are Shocked. But There'd Been Nine Men, And Nobody's Ever Raised A Question About That.

A Constitution, As Important As It Is, Will Mean Nothing Unless The People Are Yearning For Liberty And Freedom.

Depriving A Parent Of Parental Status Is As Devastating As A Criminal Conviction.

Women Will Only Have True Equality When Men Share With Them The Responsibility Of Bringing Up The Next Generation.

Arizona Presents No Specific Reason For Excepting Capital Defendants From The Constitutional Protections Extended To Defendants Generally, And None Is Readily Apparent.

Throwing Out Preclearance When It Has Worked And Is Continuing To Work To Stop Discriminatory Changes Is Like Throwing Away Your Umbrella In A Rainstorm Because You Are Not Getting Wet.

If We Gave Up Our Freedom As The Price Of Security, We Would No Longer Be The Great Nation That We Are.

Congress Could Always Stop The President If Congress Thinks That What The President Has Done Exceeds The President's Authority Or Is Just Wrong For The United States.

Undocumented Aliens Unfortunately Are Not Protected By The Law And They Are Tremendously Subjected To Exploitation. The Result Is That They Would Be Willing To Work For A Wage That No Person Who Is Welcome In Our Shores Would Take.

I Think Our System Is Being Polluted By Money.

Frankly I Had Thought That At The Time Roe Was Decided, There Was Concern About Population Growth And Particularly Growth In Populations That We Don't Want To Have Too Many Of.

Who Will Take Responsibility For Raising The Next Generation?

All Respect For The Office Of The Presidency Aside, I Assumed That The Obvious And Unadulterated Decline Of Freedom And Constitutional Sovereignty, Not To Mention The Efforts To Curb The Power Of Judicial Review, Spoke For Itself.

I Would Not Like To Be The Only Woman On The Court.

Feminism … I Think The Simplest Explanation, And One That Captures The Idea, Is A Song That Marlo Thomas Sang, 'free To Be You And Me.' Free To Be, If You Were A Girl—doctor, Lawyer, Indian Chief. Anything You Want To Be. And If You’re A Boy, And You Like Teaching, You Like Nursing, You Would Like To Have A Doll, That’s Ok Too. That Notion That We Should Each Be Free To Develop Our Own Talents, Whatever They May Be, And Not Be Held Back By Artificial Barriers—manmade Barriers, Certainly Not Heaven Sent.

Even The Declaration Of Independence Starts Out All Men Are Created Equal, So I See My Advocacy As Part Of An Effort To Make The Equality Principle Everything The Founders Would Have Wanted It To Be If They Weren't Held Back By The Society In Which They Lived And Particularly The Shame Of Slavery.

Fight For The Things That You Care About, But Do It In A Way That Will Lead Others To Join You.

There Are Just A Host Of Problems Born By The Electronic Age. Things We Couldn't Even Conceive Of. I Was Amused By The Analogy That Justice Scalia Made In A Case About A Gps Tracker So You Don't Know That's Being Done To Your Car, Is That A Violation Of Your Right To Protection Against Unreasonable Searches And Seizures. So Justice Scalia Imagines A Constable Clinging To The Bottom Of A Carriage As It Went On Its Way, So There Was Some Notion That This Similar: There Is An Official Eye That's On You, But You Don't Know About It. Yes, There Are All Kinds Of Challenges.

I Think The Notion That We Have All The Democracy That Money Can Buy Strays So Far From What Our Democracy Is Supposed To Be.

One Aspect Of Appellate Judging Is We Have To Give Reasons For All Of Our Decisions. And When You Sit Down And Try To Write It Out, Sometimes You Find That Your First Judgment Wasn't The Right One.

We Live In An Age In Which The Fundamental Principles To Which We Subscribe - Liberty, Equality And Justice For All - Are Encountering Extraordinary Challenges, ... But It Is Also An Age In Which We Can Join Hands With Others Who Hold To Those Principles And Face Similar Challenges.

Justice For All

Work Hard On Each Opinion, But Once The Case Is Decided, Don't Look Back; Go On To The Next Case And Give It Your All. It's Not Productive To Worry About What's Out And Released, Over And Done. That's Advice I Now Give To People New To The Judging Business.

My Mother Told Me Two Things Constantly. One Was To Be A Lady, And The Other Was To Be Independent. The Study Of Law Was Unusual For Women Of My Generation. For Most Girls Growing Up In The '40s, The Most Important Degree Was Not Your B.a., But Your M.r.s.

One Thing That Concerns Me Is That Today's Young Women Don't Seem To Care That We Have A Fundamental Instrument Of Government That Makes No Express Statement About The Equal Citizenship Stature Of Men And Women. They Know There Are No Closed Doors Anymore, And They May Take For Granted The Rights That They Have.

It Is Not Women's Liberation, It Is Women's And Men's Liberation.

Legislators Know Much More About Elections Than The Court Does.

The Irony And Tragedy Is Any Woman Of Means Can Have A Safe Abortion Somewhere In The United States. But Women Lacking The Wherewithal To Travel Can't. There Is No Big Constituency Out There Concerned About Access Restrictions On Poor Women.

Promoting Active Liberty Does Not Mean Allowing The Majority To Run Roughshod Over Minorities. It Calls For Taking Special Care That All Groups Have A Chance To Fully Participate In Society And The Political Process.

I Have Yet To See A Death Case Among The Dozen Coming To The Supreme Court On Eve-of-execution Stay Applications In Which The Defendant Was Well Represented At Trial... People Who Are Well Represented At Trial Do Not Get The Death Penalty.

When Contemplated In Its Extreme, Almost Any Power Looks Dangerous.

It's Great To Be In The Position Of Asking Questions And Not Having To Answer Questions.

Asking Questions

The Emphasis Must Be Not On The Right To Abortion But On The Right To Privacy And Reproductive Control.

As De Tocqueville Said, Sooner Or Later In The United States, Every Controversy Ends Up In Court. I Think That's A Great - Says Great Things About Our Judicial System.

When Police Or Prosecutors Conceal Significant Exculpatory Or Impeaching Material, We Hold, It Is Ordinarily Incumbent On The State To Set The Record Straight.

Every Gal And Every Boy That's Born Alive Is Either A Little Liberal Or Else A Little Conservative.

I Didn't Change The Constitution; The Equality Principle Was There From The Start. I Just Was An Advocate For Seeing Its Full Realization.

We Do Not Read (the Law) To Elevate Accommodation Of Religious Observances Over An Institution's Need To Maintain Order And Safety, ... We Have No Cause To Believe That (the Law) Would Not Be Applied In An Appropriately Balanced Way, Without Sensitivity To Security Concerns.

Historically, The New Government Had No Money To Pay For An Army, So They Relied On The State Militias. And The States Required Men To Have Certain Weapons And They Specified In The Law What Weapons These People Had To Keep In Their Home So That When They Were Called To Do Service As Militiamen, They Would Have Them. That Was The Entire Purpose Of The Second Amendment.

If You Have A Caring Life Partner, You Help The Other Person When That Person Needs It. I Had A Life Partner Who Thought My Work Was As Important As His, And I Think That Made All The Difference For Me.

Dissents Speak To A Future Age.

Reproductive Choice Has To Be Straightened Out. There Will Never Be A Woman Of Means Without Choice Anymore. That Just Seems To Me So Obvious. The States That Changed Their Abortion Laws Before Roe Are Not Going To Change Back. So We Have A Policy That Only Affects Poor Women, And It Can Never Be Otherwise.

Women's Rights Are An Essential Part Of The Overall Human Rights Agenda, Trained On The Equal Dignity And Ability To Live In Freedom All People Should Enjoy.

If I Had Any Talent God Could Give Me, I Would Be A Great Diva.

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