If Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg was just another female lawyer, I would still have an affinity for her, but she was so much more. RBG WAS A BRILLIANT PIONEER WHO PROMOTED GENDER EQUALITY BEFORE HER TIME. She was amazing person, an amazing jurist, and had a brilliant legal mind.
I identify with her in some ways. She went to law school after she had married. So did I. However, she went to Harvard coming from Cornell while I came from UMKC Law after studying for my undergraduate degree at UMKC. RBG WAS NUMBER ONE IN HER CLASS, WHILE I CLEARLY WAS SOMEWHERE IN MY CLASS, but certainly not in the top ten.
She and I were married with a child when entering law school. She graduated and had a four-year old daughter, while I had a four year old son when I graduated. We both ended up fighting for civil rights, but me on a much smaller scale than Justice Ginsburg. We both had second children while new to the practice of law. THAT IS WHERE THE COMPARISON ENDS.
That’s where our paths differed. The brilliant Justice, after 6 arguments for women’s rights before the Supreme Court representing litigants, earned a district court judgeship in New York, followed in 1993 by an appointment to the grandest of all Courts, the U.S. Supreme Court, where she excelled for 17 years. RBG is a legend. She worked at court while she went through illness and ultimately was dying and suffering from cancer. She worked the day after her beloved husband died. She wrote dissents to save for posterity, in case a future court would adopt her opinion as someday as a majority opinion. SHE WAS FREAKING AMAZING AND AN INCREDIBLE ROLE MODEL. WE WILL MISS HER SO.
