RUTH - Justice Ginsburg in her own Words (2019) - full transcript

How does some one with three strikes against her, rise to the highest court in the land, the U. S. Supreme Court?

[slow poignant

instrumental music]

- I don't like to speak of

my own personal experience,

but I will cite one example

because it is a general one.

I did very well in law school.

It was not possible

to do much better.

There was not a single

law firm in the whole city

of New York that would invite me

to come even for an interview.

I don't have two heads, so

that wasn't the problem.

I suspected that the door

was closed because of my sex,

so the barriers were there,

and it isn't simply a question

of changing ages of marriage.

Institutions, gatekeepers

shut the door to women,

and those doors have

been open very recently.

- [Man] How are you holding up?

[muffled speaking]

[people applauding]

[heels clacking]

[muffled chatter]

- There's remarkable

little knowledge

among college students

about the Supreme Court.

I've been teaching college

students almost every year

that I've been a law

professor, and it's remarkable

how few justices they could name

or how little they know

about the Constitution.

I've seen opinion

polls that more people

can name the Seven Dwarfs

than can name justices

on the United States

Supreme Court.

I think it's because

people don't appreciate

how much what the Supreme

Court does affects their lives.

[muffled chatter]

- All righty. Good

evening, everybody.

[people cheering]

- Well, welcome to

the White House.

[people cheering and applauding]

- There she is, also known

as the Notorious RBG.

[lively instrumental music]

[audience applauds]

- Please give a warm welcome

to Supreme Court Justice

Ruth Bader Ginsberg.

- So Notorious BIG and I

had something in common.

We were both born and bred

in Brooklyn, New York.

- How does it feel to

become at this stage

in your life this character?

- It's awesome.

[audience laughs and applauds]

- "I'm not a rockstar"?

Au contraire.

[audience laughs]

She is a rockstar. [laughs]

[crowd cheering]

[soft poignant music]

[audience applauds]

- Thank you.

My assignment this morning is

to describe the

essential difference

between the 14th Amendment

and the proposed

Equal Rights Amendment

as a foundation for

a constitutional sex

equality principle.

In a nutshell, the

difference is this.

The equal status and dignity

of men and women under the law

is the animating purpose

of Equal Rights Amendment.

By contrast, sex equality

was not contemplated

by the framers of

the 14th Amendment.

The law is a

consuming love for me.

It seemed to me an area in

which women were not yet wanted.

When you look at

the Supreme Court

and there isn't one woman,

you don't aspire to something

that is such a

remote possibility.

- [Woman] Were you surprised

when you were appointed?

- I don't think it's fair

to say that I was surprised.

I was elated that the

Carter administration

made a concerted effort to

appoint women to the judiciary

so then, at that

point, I could aspire.

- [Woman] Do you have

any aspirations for

the Supreme Court?

- I'm entirely

content with the job

that I now have as I did not

target the Court of Appeals

for the DC circuit as

my life's ambition.

So I don't target any other job.

[flash bulbs bursting]

- She argued six

landmark cases in behalf

of women before the United

States Supreme Court

and happily won five out of six.

I am proud to nominate this

pathbreaking attorney, advocate,

and judge to be

the 107th justice

to the United States

Supreme Court.

[audience applauds]

[flash bulbs bursting]

- Mr. President, I am

grateful beyond measure

for the confidence

you have placed in me.

I have a thank you.

It is to my mother,

Celia Amster Bader,

the bravest and strongest

person I have known,

who was taken from

me much too soon.

I pray that I may be all

that she would have been

had she lived in an age when

women could aspire and achieve

and daughters are

cherished as much as sons.

Thank you.

[audience applauds]

[flash bulbs bursting]

- This is only the day after

my nomination was announced.

I'm still sometimes thinking

I'm walking in a dream.

[flash bulbs bursting]

- [Woman] Some reports from

conservative interest group

that they are concerned that

Judge Ginsburg may legislate

from the bench and not

merely interpret the law.

- I have never

been as optimistic

in naming Judge Ginsburg

to move to the court.

She probably

will have had a more

difficult time the first time

in the circuit

court than she will

through the Supreme Court.

- I intend to cooperate

with the committee

in every way I can to

expedite the process,

and for the rest,

I am what I am,

and I hope that they

will be pleased.

[heels clacking]

[muffled chatter]

- Today, the Senate

Judiciary Committee

welcomed Judge Ruth

Bader Ginsburg,

the president's nominee

to be associate justice

of the United States

Supreme Court.

[muffled chatter]

[gavel bangs]

Would you be kind

enough though, judge,

to introduce your family to us?

- My life's partner for

39 years, Martin Ginsburg.

- [Joe] Welcome, welcome.

- [Ruth] And my son from

the great state of Chicago,

James Ginsburg.

- All right. [laughs]

- And my incredible

daughter, Jane Ginsberg

and Clara and Paul Spera.

- Well, you have quite a

family, and we welcome you all.

Senator Metzenbaum.

- Happy to see you

here, Judge Ginsburg.

In your view is the right

to choose a fundamental

constitutional right?

[tense contemplative music]

- Majority of the court has

said that this is a right

of a woman guaranteed

by the 14th Amendment.

It's a decision that she

must make for herself.

The case poses the

question, who decides?

Is it the state

or the individual?

I think that the

most recent decision

says the woman decides.

- I think you ought to tell

us where you really come down

on this thing because

I'm not asking you

to decide a future case.

I'm just asking you to is

it in the Constitution?

Is it constitutional?

- It's certainly a

question that is going

to be before this court, so

this is the kind of question

that it would be injudicious

for me to address.

- Our next panel is

comprised of representatives

of a number of groups

wishing to testify

in opposition to the

nomination of Judge Ginsburg.

- Consistent with her

warped perspective,

Mrs. Ginsburg, as a litigator,

argued that pregnancy

should be treated

as a disability rather

than as a gift from God.

- Because Judge Ginsburg

holds this view,

I oppose her

nomination and urge you

to vote against

the confirmation.

- Personally, I disagree

with her on this issue,

but she's an excellent person

and a fine judicial scholar.

- [Joe] The next

panel is comprised

of a former ACLU colleague.

- When she was

teaching at Columbia

and running the ACLU

Women's Rights Project,

her vision of social justice

was instructive to all of us.

Her nomination to

the Supreme Court,

I think, fulfills her destiny.

- I was just wondering what

it was in your own experience

that really led you

to take this path

and devote so much

of your career

to breaking down

the legal barriers,

the advancement of the

women in our society.

- Senator Kennedy, I'm very

sensitized to discrimination.

I grew up at the time of World

War II in a Jewish family.

[slow somber instrumental music]

I have memories as a

child, even before the war,

of being in a car with my

parents and driving places,

and there was a sign

in front of a resort,

and it said, "No dogs

or Jews allowed."

That in this country

during my childhood.

People who have

known discrimination

are bound to be

sympathetic to understand.

I want to thank Judge

Ginsburg for revealing

not only the

brilliant of her mind

but I think of her

soul and heart as well.

- Now I know just how

really fitting and proper

and how significant this

vote is going to be for me.

- Whatever you've been doing

has worked pretty well,

so keep doing it.

[poignant instrumental music]

[muffled chatter]

[audience applauds]

- I, Ruth Bader Ginsburg,

do solemnly swear.

- I, Ruth Bader Ginsburg,

do solemnly swear.

- That I will support and

defend the Constitution

of the United States.

- That I will support and

defend the Constitution

of the United States.

- So help me God.

- So help me God.

[flash bulbs bursting]

[audience applauds]

- [Bill] Her story already

is a part of our history.

Now her words and her

judgments will help

to shape our nation today and

well into the 21st century.

- It's by far the best

place I have ever worked.

The relationship among

the justices is very close

because no matter how

great our differences

on what the law

is or ought to be,

we know it will suffer

if we can't get on well

Having Justice O'Connor

here for 12 years

before I came made it

infinitely easier for me.

She is an exceptionally fine

and well-respected judge,

and she has been such a warm

and wonderful friend to me.

Although we come from very

different areas of the country,

I would say there's much more

bonding between the two of us

than there is between any

two men on that court.

[audience laughs]

I wish student groups would

come and visit the court.

A very hearty welcome to the

Supreme Court to all of you.

Please sit down, and

perhaps one of the teachers

can tell me a little

bit about you.

- You have two classes

of 5th grade students,

ages ranging between

10 and 12 years old,

and we're from Indianapolis.

- [Ruth] Very good.

- Was it hard to be on

the Supreme Court justice

because you're a woman?

- It's becoming

less and less hard.

When I graduated

from law school,

no woman in the history of

the country had ever been

on the Supreme Court,

but times have changed.

[upbeat lively 50s music]

My mother wanted me

to be a school teacher

because that would afford

me a nice steady income

and leave time for a

husband and a family.

Doors were totally

shut to most women.

Women simply could

not be prosecutors.

The law was not the

way to independence.

When I graduated from law

school with high grades,

there was not a single law

firm in the entire city

of New York that

offered me employment.

In those days, I had

three strikes against me.

One is I was Jewish, and many

firms were just beginning

to let down racial, religious,

national origin barriers.

Another, I was a

woman, and then the one

that I think really did me in

was I had a

four-year-old daughter.

It was enough of a risk to

take a chance on a woman,

but taking a chance on

a mother was too much.

[tense contemplative music]

- Justice Ginsburg,

first of all,

I'd like to say that

you don't look anything

near 60 years of age.

[laughs]

And secondly, could you

tell us a little bit

about your family history?

[light jaunty music]

- My husband was my

classmate in college.

We met when he was

18 and I was 17.

- The truth is, it was a blind

date only on Ruth's side.

[audience laughs]

I cheated.

[audience laughs]

- We were best friends

during our college days.

- "Oh, she's really cute,"

I perceptively noticed.

[audience laughs]

And then after a

couple of evenings out,

I, "and boy she's

really, really smart."

- And when I graduated from

college, we got married.

I have a daughter and a son.

My daughter has two

wonderful children.

- It's quite simple.

Your wife has a job,

which, deep in your heart,

you wish you had.

[audience laughs]

- It wasn't easy to

get that first job.

I had a great professor.

He recommended me to a judge

who always hired his law

clerks from Columbia.

The judge said, "Well,

I've looked at her resume.

She has a four-year-old

daughter. How can

I rely on her?"

And the professor said, "If

you don't give her a chance,

I will never recommend another

Columbia clerk to you."

[audience laughs]

And that's how I got my

first job [muffled speaking].

There was an offer

from Rutgers Law School

to teach procedure.

If I didn't take it, an

offer my never come again.

My students, they wanted a

course in women in the law.

In the space of one month, I

read every federal decision

that had ever been written in

the area of gender in the law.

There was barely anything.

[women chanting faintly]

[up-tempo uplifting music]

- [Irin] The country was

experiencing upheavals inspired

by activists who were

no longer willing

to accept the status quo.

- [Ruth] Women came into the

American Civil Liberties Union

and complained that they had

to go on maternity leave.

You didn't get paid

for that leave,

and you didn't have

any right of return

unless the school

wanted you back.

- [Woman] There were

still laws on the books

that said women can't work

more than certain hours.

They can't work at night.

They can't lift

more than 15 pounds.

And basically,

those laws were used

to keep women out

of high-paying jobs.

- [Ruth] The American

Civil Liberties Union

in New Jersey turned to me,

so those are the

cases we started with.

- The ACLU was at the beginning

of doing women's rights work

and was really in the forefront

of big-time gender

discrimination litigation,

and Ruth was the head of it.

- [Ruth] Our lead

case was Reed V Reed

[soft melancholy

instrumental music]

Sally Reed, whose

son died tragically

and killed himself with

his father's rifle.

She wanted to be appointed

administrator of his estate.

The statute read, "As between

persons equally entitled

to administer a

decedent's estate,

males must be

preferred to females,"

and it was the

turning point case.

- It was the first time

the Supreme Court found

that gender discrimination

was unconstitutional.

The decision in that

case was revolutionary.

Ruth spent the next 10 years

just blasting the door open.

- [Girl] Of the six women's

right cases you've argued

before the Supreme Court,

which do you think has

made the biggest change?

- One of my favorites

involved a father,

a man whose wife was the

dominant earner in the family,

and she died tragically

in childbirth.

He wanted to work only part

time and tend to his child.

He sought social

security benefits

to assist him in that

effort and was told,

"Well, those benefits

aren't available to you.

Those are mother's benefits."

- The judges actually

disbelieved that this

could be a real

case because they

couldn't imagine a man wanting

to be the primary

caregiver to his son.

- [Ruth] That judgment

declares the gender line

at issue unconstitutional

because it discriminates

in violation of

the 5th Amendment

against gainfully employed

women, such as Paula Wiesenfeld,

as well as against

men and children

who have lost their

wives and mothers.

- [Warren] A three-judge

district court in

New Jersey held

that this sex-based

discrimination was

unconstitutional.

We agree, and we affirm.

[poignant instrumental music]

- [Ruth] The Supreme Court

unanimously held in favor

of that father because the

baby who had lost a mother

rather than a father did

not have the opportunity

to be cared for by the

sole surviving parent.

The strategy was to go

after gender stereotypes

and to rid the law books

of these arbitrary lines

that separated the

world into two spheres,

the world outside the home,

which belonged the man,

and the world within the home

that was women's province.

- [ME] She came up with the

idea of using men as plaintiffs.

- These were men who is the

male survivor of a wife,

they didn't get the benefit.

It was discrimination

against the widower,

but it was also discrimination

against the woman.

- We were given various

tasks relating to the briefs,

and she discussed

the case with us,

and we saw the

evolution of the briefs.

We would do drafts, and then

Ruth would rewrite them.

[laughs] She was an amazing

writer, and the expression was,

"If you could get the briefs

to sing," and hers sang.

They were powerful.

It's like people said when

Tiger Woods was at his peak,

Tiger was playing golf up here,

and everybody else was

playing golf down there.

He was at another level,

and Ruth was like that.

- Craig Versus Boren and

sometimes called the Beer Case.

[audience laughs]

Oklahoma had a very silly law.

Girls could buy beer at age 18,

but the boys had to

wait until age 21.

So the thirsty boys

at a fraternity

[audience laughs]

in Stillwater, Oklahoma

brought this case.

[bluesy rock guitar music]

- [Man] It says that all

females, even those that

are the most drunk, most

alcoholic, most immature,

and most irresponsible

may purchase 3.2% beer

at age 18 in absolutely

unlimited quantities.

- [Warren] The

law doesn't say it

in quite those words, does it?

[audience laughs]

- [Man] No, your honor,

and the law doesn't say it

in quite the words that

all males 18 to 21,

even though they are the

most mature, most sober,

or most self restrained

can't purchase a drop of it.

- Trying to hear

[laughs] the Oklahoma,

I think it was the

Oklahoma attorney general,

argue this case seriously

was just hysterical.

That case in some ways it's

so stupid that it was easier,

but it was a good precedent

because it got people

thinking about stereotypes.

- I can tell you a case

that made a big difference.

It was a case involving

service of women on juries.

Women were not called for jury

duty unless they volunteered,

and that was regarded as fine,

not as any kind of

discrimination against women

but, in fact, discrimination

in their favor.

But some women had the sense

that the state was making them

or regarded them as

dispensable, not really needed.

- [Warren] We'll

hear arguments next

in 6067, Duren against Missouri.

- [Man] Mr. Chief Justice,

may it please the court.

In March of 1976, petitioner

Billy Duren appeared for trial

in the Jackson

County Circuit Court.

Appearing with Mr.

Duren was a jury panel.

That panel of 53 people

included only five women.

If women are not on juries

in sufficient numbers,

Billy Duren's right to a fair

cross-sectional jury panel

has been defeated.

[melancholy contemplative

instrumental music]

- I divided the argument

with the public defender

from Kansas City, so I

had a precious 15 minutes.

- [Warren] Mrs. Ginsburg,

if you may lower the lectern

if you would like.

[courtroom chuckles]

- Mr. Chief justice, and

may it please the court

hear Billy Duren's

right to a fair chance

for a jury genuinely

representative

of the communities

complexion, and second,

the vaunted woman's privilege.

Women traditionally were

deemed lesser citizens.

- [Warren] That wouldn't

concern Mr. Duren, would it?

- [Ruth] Mr. Duren has

a right to a jury drawn

from a panel reasonably

representative of the community.

- I actually sat with

her at council table.

Now, very few, I think,

other people or professors

would have been that

gracious and allowed that,

but that was the kind

of person Ruth was.

What was interesting was

watching the oral argument

because Ruth, she clearly

had the respect of the court.

She did very well in

her quiet and direct way

with the court.

Thurgood Marshall, he was very

interesting in oral argument,

and I got the sense

that he got it,

totally got it because

he had been there

and he understood a world

judging you by something

like race or gender that

you had no control over,

and that essentially had really

not much to do with anything

except in the eyes of people

who were stereotyping.

- [Byron] Under

the Missouri law,

women are eligible

for jury duty,

but they are entitled to

an automatic exemption.

No similar excuse

is available to men.

Duren claims that his a 6th

and 14th amendment right

to a trial by a

jury representing a

fair cross section

of the community is

violated by this scheme.

[pleasant uplifting piano music]

- As this court

said in the 1960s,

women are the center of

home and family life.

One of my answers

to that question

was men ought to be there, too,

sharing the work of caring

for children and the home,

and women should be

regarded as citizens

in the public arena of

equal stature with men.

That was the essential

message that I endeavored

to get across in all

the cases that I argued.

- Justice Ginsburg

slowly convinced the

Supreme Court that,

under the Equal Protection

Clause of the 14th amendment

and also the 5th amendment,

the government could not

say that men and women

were fundamentally

different and needed

to be treated as

such under the law.

The way that she

approached it was

to take these nine male

justices by the hand

and lead them very

slowly on a path,

and it wasn't until

she had almost entirely

accomplished her goals did they

realize how far they'd come.

- In retrospect and

what we accomplished

and looking back

on those two years,

I always say there was a

brief and shining moment

in my life when I helped

change the world. [chuckles]

[camera clicks]

- I would like to present

to you this gift bag

from the city of Indianapolis.

We are known for our winning

Indiana Pacers basketball team

and, of course,

the Indy 500 race.

I sincerely hope you

enjoy our gifts to you.

- Miss, thank you so much.

Oh, let's see this.

- These are flags from the-

- These are flags from-

- Indianapolis for

the Indy 500 race.

- Ah. These I may

share with my grandson.

I think he would

appreciate that.

[audience applauds]

Well thank you so much.

[audience applauds]

ME Freedman was one of

my wonderful students

who made it possible

for dreams to come true.

I remember our first meeting.

ME came to my office a

little angry and said,

"The way women are treated

by the law is dreadful,

and I want to take courses

that will help me do things

to aid women."

And I said, "If you want

to aid women and men

and make a better society,

become a damn good lawyer,"

and that's exactly

what she has done.

- She was clearly the

intellectual equal,

if not the superior, of the

nine men she was arguing before.

She was light years ahead

of us and of the justice

who asked the question and

taught her students to be aware

of the need to judge

individuals on their merits,

not on the basis of

stereotype and qualities

like gender that

have nothing to do

with merit and

ability to do the job.

Thank you.

[audience applauds]

- If any of you have the

opportunity to do that kind

of not-for-profit

public interest work,

you should grab it.

It was an amazing experience.

- I'd like to tell you the happy

ending to one of the cases.

The baby in that story is today

in his last year of college

and has recently applied

to Columbia Law School.

[audience applauds and exclaims]

[uplifting poignant music]

[cameras clicking]

[muffled chatter]

[muffled chatter]

[group applauds]

This was my first

grade class, too,

and I learned to read and

to write in this room.

[cameras clicking]

To all my friends in this room,

my heart is just brimming over.

There isn't a place that I

would rather have dedicated

to me in this building

than the library.

This is where I learned to read.

This is where I learned

to love learning.

[muffled chatter]

- [Winston] Justice

Ginsburg, who a role model

when you were growing up?

- Winston, they didn't

have a term role model

when I was growing up, but

I can think about someone

who was in a book and not real.

But I guess she was a role

model for a lot of us.

She was Nancy Drew.

[audience laughs]

And then there was

Amelia Earhart.

Not too many women in the

lawyering or judging line

because mostly,

they didn't exist.

[audience applauds]

[cameras clicking]

- [Woman] We are

proud of this room.

We dedicate it to you,

the Ruth Bade

Ginsburg courtroom,

and we hope you will

visit many times.

- I've judged moot courts

all around the country,

but I never dreamed

that a courtroom

would be named after me,

and this is remarkable.

How did you do this?

- [Woman] Well, let's

have for students come up

and make that presentation.

- Here, your portrait will

hang in this courtroom

as an inspiration to us all

because you represent the level

of excellence that all

of us hope to achieve.

Thank you.

- The first time a port was

done of me, it was a huge woman.

And I looked and it,

I said to the artist,

I showed her my hand.

I said, "Well, my

wrist is very small."

She put a dab of black paint,

but her notion was a woman

to be in power must be large.

She must be at least five

foot 10 and not five foot two.

That looks like me. That's...

[audience laughs and applauds]

[melancholy piano music]

The children seem

genuinely happy.

I was happy most of

the time in PS 238,

but I was still there

in the day when,

if you were

left-handed as I was,

the teacher tried

to make you change.

So I remember crying

in the first grade

because I did my penmanship,

and it was simply awful,

but I did it with my

right hand, and I got a D,

and I said, "I will never again

write with my right hand."

The story that was told about

the girls having cooking

and sewing while

the boys had shop,

I remember envying the boys long

before I even knew

the word feminist

'cause I liked shop better

than cooking or sewing.

Our neighborhood was

predominantly Irish,

Italian, Polish,

Catholic, and Jewish.

My mother told me two things.

One was to be a lady and the

other was to be independent,

but most girls

growing up in the 40s

were to find Prince Charming

and live happily ever after.

She said it was most important

to get a job and support myself.

Sadly, she died when I was 17.

She died the day before

my high school graduation.

- She really doesn't talk

much about how that felt.

She internalizes it.

She's quite stoic.

Whether it's her sister

dying young as a child,

whether it's her

mother dying the day

before her high

school graduation,

without that kind of skillset,

everything that

life threw at her,

we might not have her on

the Supreme Court today.

- I think my daughter

is following much

the same career path

as I did.

Jane will speak for herself,

but she might have preferred

something more venturesome

than law because it wasn't a

daring thing to do anymore.

- [Woman] Speak

for yourself, Jane.

[audience laughs]

- I don't know whether I

wanna characterize things

in terms of daring or not,

but I guess I certainly

got the feeling that a law

was a profession which gave

you a fair amount of autonomy.

[bright uplifting

poignant music]

- [Ruth] We are the first

mother daughter who have taught

at a law school in

the United States.

- My daughter is

three years old,

so it's a little premature.

It'd be nice if she would

be a concert pianist.

She's a pretty

feisty little kid.

There will be legal examples

of bounding since her mother

and her father and

her grandmother

and her grandfather

are all lawyers,

which might persuade her after

all to be a concert pianist

if the talent is there.

[audience laughs]

- Enter the robing room.

The first thing we do

is go around the room,

each justice shaking

hands with every other.

And that's a symbol of the work

that we do as a collegial body.

We go around the

room in seniority

so the chief will

summarize the case.

No one can enter the room

who is not a justice,

no secretary, no law clerk.

You will not see a laptop.

Notes are taken by

each justice by hand.

They're just a

private conversation

among the justices

about the case.

- When Justice Ginsburg

first became a judge,

she left some of the

work she had hoped

to accomplish unfinished.

Now she got close, but

she didn't go all the way.

With the US versus

Virginia, the VMI case,

she came even closer.

- The Virginia

Military Institute case

is one of a line

of decisions saying

that no doors should

be closed to people

who have the talent and the

will to enter and do the job.

[men shouting in distance]

[soft pleasant music]

It was a school maintained

by the state in Virginia

that gave a good education.

[footsteps marching in unison]

It was a grant opportunity,

but the state afforded it

only to members of one sex.

- [Man] What we have here

is a single sex institution

for men as designed as a

place to teach manly values

that only men can learn to show

that men can suffer

adversity and succeed.

- [Ruth] If women

are to be leaders

in life and in the

military, then men have got

to become accustomed to

taking commands from women,

and men won't become

accustomed to that

if women aren't let in.

- [Man] This court is

called upon to decide

as whether a state institution

can model its program

on the assumption that

there are certain things

that women can't do in general.

There are certain things that

men will not do with women

because those men think that

women are not capable of that.

[guns cocking]

- Here, the administration

has total control over us.

They can come in our

rooms anytime they want,

and I don't think

that a female student

would like it very

much if somebody

from administration came

in and kicked in her door,

no matter what she was doing.

- They don't belong there.

It's been an all-male school,

just like some of

the black students

in Alabama and Mississippi

are all male black schools.

They don't want whites.

They don't want females.

Leave 'em alone.

- If you don't let women in,

you're gonna always have that

question as to is it fair?

And you always want to

be fair to everybody,

and everybody should have

the same opportunities

as everybody else.

[men shouting indistinctly]

[cannon booms]

- [Ruth] On behalf

of women capable

of all the activities

required of VMI cadets,

instituted this lawsuit in 1990,

maintaining that under the

Equal Protection Clause

of the 14th amendment to the

United States Constitution,

Virginia may not reserve

exclusively for men.

[pleasant uplifting music]

[upbeat marching music]

- No one expects you to be able

to run this marathon today.

VMI will provide

you the training

and the conditioning

necessary in such a way

that you will grow over time.

- I remember being

in high school

and watching the VMI decision

when I was in GROTC class,

and I remember hearing and

watching Justice Ginsburg.

And in essence, what

she said is that women

are not inferior to men,

and we can do all things.

My best friend at the time said,

"Women don't belong there."

I told him, "I'm committed."

I said, "Not only will I

go, but I'll graduate."

And so he bet me

$1 in that moment

that I wouldn't make

it out my first year

at the Virginia

Military Institute.

We actually went along

with another fellow cadet,

and I was the only

one to graduate.

My first year was a

little bit of a blur.

There wasn't that many women.

I can't remember

the exact numbers,

but it was a handful of us.

[helicopter blades whirring]

I think everyone at some point

in time thinks about quitting.

It's hundreds of pushups,

thousands of sit ups,

multiple mal runs with

50-pound back sacks.

There's a lot of yelling.

There's a lot of screaming.

There's no locks on any doors,

and you're roaming

right beside hundreds

of males on either side.

[cadets shouting indistinctly]

I don't think anything

can prepare you

to that type of experience.

Well, now I am a proud mom of

twin boys, Alex and Xander.

They're 10 months now.

I'm a public defender

in Arlington,

and I'm also the delegate

for the 2nd District

of Prince William and Stafford.

My grandmother always

told me to be the change

that you want to see, so

I decided to throw my hat

in the race and

make that change.

[bright uplifting music]

VMI instilled principles

in me that I know I

wouldn't have received

any other place.

Well, it teaches you a

fortitude and integrity

and a gogetitness.

Some people would

say to me afterward,

"Well, you were

pregnant," and I'm like,

"Well, that's never an

excuse to not do anything."

We wanna put a qualified

teacher in every classroom.

[group cheering and clapping]

[muffled speaking]

My husband and I met

on the second day

at Virginia Military Institute.

It's no problem for him

to stay home and to be

with the babies while

I'm out knocking doors

or going to functions or

speaking at political events.

It is very difficult to know

where I would be right now

if it wasn't for Justice

Ginsburg and her opinion.

She laid the foundation

for all of us,

especially me as

a woman to be able

to attend Virginia

Military Institute,

and I think it helped me reach

the place where I am today.

[footsteps marching in distance]

- On behalf of VMI corps

cadets, faculty, and staff,

as well as Washington and

Lee and School of Law,

we'd like to present with you

with these tokens

of our appreciation.

[audience applauds]

- Who would've imagined

that this woman

who nobody would give a

job when she graduated

from law school would

now not only be one

of the nine on the Supreme Court

but also calling upon

the groundbreaking work

that she had done

as an advocate.

It really came full circle

with US Versus Virginia.

- Oh, isn't that beautiful?

- [Woman] Thank you so much.

[audience applauds]

- Thank you.

- Thank you.

- This will be placed on a

shelf just behind my desk,

and I am very proud

to put it there.

- There was only one

dissenter in the case

that allowed women into the

Virginia Military Institute.

Justice Scalia dissented.

- [Antonin] It's not

that women can't do it.

It was that it would interfere

with the kind of relationship

among the students that

produces the adversative method.

- So I took this dissent,

this very spicy dissent,

and it absolutely

ruined my weekend

at the second service.

[audience laughs and claps]

[light pleasant music]

How we could be friends

given our disagreement

on lots of things,

Justice Scalia answered,

"I attack ideas, I

don't attack people.

Some very good people

have some very bad ideas."

[audience laughs and claps]

Our friendship should

not have been surprising

to people who watched the court.

He has an extraordinary

ability to make you smile.

When we were on the

DC circuit together,

Justice Scalia would

whisper something to me.

All I could do to avoid

laughing out loud,

so I would sometimes

pinch myself.

[audience chuckles]

People sometimes ask me,

"Well, what was your

favorite Scalia joke?"

And I said, "I know what it

is, but I can't tell you."

[audience laughs]

- To justify the

position of, well,

you can have some slop over.

You don't have to be

too precise about it.

It doesn't matter.

- [Man] He's called

an originalist,

meaning he believes

that the Constitution

ought to be interpreted

more or less

as the founding fathers meant

for it to be interpreted.

- Contemplating

what the forefathers

would have envisioned had they

foreseen modern conditions.

- [Man] Her view is

that the Constitution

is what has been called

a living document,

meaning it changes

as society changes.

- I'm sorry, please.

- I was going to.

[muffled speaking]

You wouldn't wanna live

in most of the countries

of the world that

have a bill of rights

which guarantees freedom

of speech and of the press.

You wouldn't wanna live there.

- I have to disagree with my

colleagues in that respect.

- [Marvin] I'm glad

that you can do it.

First,

[audience laughs]

I don't think that

the rest of the world

is regarding our legislature

at the current moment

as a model to be followed.

[audience laughs and claps]

[soft pleasant music]

- She disagreed with

everything that he said,

but she loved how he said it.

I don't think that they ever

changed each other's minds.

- Now what's not to like

[audience laughs]

except her views of

the law, of course?

[everyone laughs]

- It was about mutual respect.

There was a warmth there.

Their families were friends.

They would spend

New Year's together.

- And Ruth, honest to goodness,

went up behind a motor boat

in a sail-

- Parasail.

- Yeah.

[audience laughs]

- She's so light, you would

think she would never come down.

[audience laughs]

- There's no greater lover of

opera than Justice Ginsburg.

- If I could have any

talent God could give me,

I would be a great diva

because I simply love opera.

- So to bring together

her famous friendship

with Scalia in opera form in

many ways was her life's dream.

[bright pleasant music]

[set banging]

- [Woman] We're here at the

Castleton Opera Festival

for "Scalia/Ginsburg."

It's an opera about two

Supreme Court justices,

how they are on opposite sides

of the ideological spectrum,

but they're best friends.

♪ Ruth Bader Ginsburg ♪

[audience laughs]

♪ It's not the first

time I've had to break ♪

♪ Through a ceiling ♪

[audience laughs and cheers]

♪ Flexible ♪

♪ Just another

word for liberal ♪

[audience laughs]

- [Irin] She did not get

to sing the arias herself.

She always says, "I'd have

the voice of a sparrow."

- I had a wonderful time.

I loved every minute of it.

The song that they sang tonight,

"We are different, we are one,"

I think that captures it.

♪ We are different ♪

- [Ruth] We each understand

the way the other thinks.

♪ We are one ♪

[soft poignant

instrumental music]

- He was indeed a

magnificent performer.

How blessed I was to

have a working colleague

and dear friend of such

captivating brilliance,

high spirits, and quick wit.

In the words of a

duet for tenor Scalia

and soprano Ginsburg,

"We were different."

Yes, in our interpretation

of written text,

yet one in our

reverence for the court

and its place in the US.

[audience applauds]

♪ Ruth Bader Ginsburg ♪

♪ Doctor of law ♪

♪ Come to hear us at the opera ♪

♪ Direct from the

Supreme Court ♪

[audience cheers and applauds]

- A lot of law students go

straight into the world of work,

but one of the

transition points to get

into the world of

work is clerking.

Clerking is an opportunity

to get behind the scenes

and see a little bit of

how judges make decisions,

which is an

invaluable experience.

[melancholy contemplative

instrumental music]

I got very lucky. Yes, I did.

I got very lucky, yes.

Working for Justice

Ginsburg was,

in addition to a great honor,

just a tremendous

learning experience.

She's a meticulous editor.

She's a very independent writer.

She's a very

independent thinker.

It was a somewhat

unusual year because

of the Bush versus Gore case.

- [Man] The Supreme Court

has, for the first time

in American history, decided

to step into a legal dispute

in the midst of a

presidential election.

[crowd chanting indistinctly]

- That's not every term that

you get something like that.

- [Ted] This is something

that is unprecedented

in the state of Florida.

That's another change

that took place.

- [Ruth] Mr. Olson, you

have said the intent

of the voters simply won't do.

It's too vague.

It's too subjective.

But at least, at

least those words,

intent of the voter,

are for the legislature.

- One of the most

remarkable things, I felt,

in watching her up

close during that time

was that she never

lost her cool.

But in the main, you

get to see a little bit

of how the court functions

as an institution

and how the nine

justices decide cases.

I've asked her

about how she thinks

about all the work

she's done as a judge,

and one of the things

she told me is,

"Do your best work

on every case,

decide it, and then let it go."

You cast your vote or

your write your opinion,

and there's the next

case and the next case.

That's true, but your brief

contains not a single example

of anything else

you think is exempt

from this prohibition

other than a law license.

She's been an incredible mentor

to me well past

that single year.

I've had the great

privilege of remaining

in contact with her.

She's every bit the

person she was. [laughs]

And the current

current challenges?

- The statute books

that were once riddled

with overt sex-based

classification,

in the decade of the 70s,

almost all of them were gone.

What's left and is

harder to get at

is what I call unconscious bias.

Sometimes, it's a

device that works

to overcome unconscious bias,

and my example of that is

the symphony orchestra.

When I was growing up,

you never saw a woman

except playing the harp.

Someone had the bright

idea of dropping a curtain

so the people who were

conducting the audition

didn't know if it

was a woman or a man.

And with that simple

change, the dropped curtain,

almost overnight, women

started to show up

in symphony orchestras.

Not only do we audition

behind a curtain,

but we audition shoeless.

[soft contemplative

instrumental music]

- So you now sit on a court

that has three women on it.

I actually sit on a court

that has the majority

of women on it, including

a woman as chief justice.

Do you think that the law

would be much different

if there were, say,

four or five women

on the US Supreme Court?

- I think it's pretty good

that we have three now.

Three makes the big difference

because we're all

over the bench,

and I sit toward the middle

because I've been

around so long.

[audience laughs]

And if any of you have come to

watch the show at the court,

you know that my

newest colleagues

are not shrinking violets.

[audience laughs]

And yet there are some

cases that at least I think

would have come

out the other way

if there were five

women or more,

and one of them is

Lilly Ledbetter's case.

Every woman understood

Lilly's problem.

[contemplative music]

[car whooshing past]

Lilly was a woman who worked

in a Goodyear tire plant.

She was an area manager.

She was hired in the 1970s

when only men were

doing that job.

She was the first woman.

- There was a huge writeup in

the "Business Week" magazine

about Goodyear Gadsden.

They were going to

start hiring women

and minorities into

management positions.

They offered me a

job, but I was told,

"You will never

discuss your pay."

And no one would ever say

anything about their pay.

It was a good job for a

woman. Goodyear was hard work.

I knew it was hot

in the factory.

I knew it was dirty,

but I continued to

work extremely hard,

extremely cautious, because

I knew, being a woman,

I could not make a mistake.

[traffic whooshing past]

I'd gone in to do

my 12-hour shift,

pulled out all my paperwork,

and this whole piece

of paper had first

names, base pay.

I knew when I saw mine.

It was exactly to the dollar,

which was an odd amount, 3,727.

The other three on

that piece of paper

was almost $6,000

a month base pay.

- She was at rock bottom.

The young man that

she had trained

was getting more

money than she was.

- I was embarrassed.

I was humiliated.

I tried to figure out

where did this come from?

Who knew this? I've still

got two kids in college.

I've still got a house mortgage.

I've still got car payments.

I can't quit. I can't quit.

I can't go home. I've

got to do this shift.

I told my husband when

I got home that morning,

"This is not right what's been

done to me and my family."

So I started searching

for an attorney

that could take my case

on a contingence basis,

and we went all the way

to the Supreme Court.

[dramatic music]

- [John] We'll

hear argument next

in Ledbetter versus Goodyear

Tire and Rubber Company.

- Mr. Chief Justice, and

may it please the court.

A jury found that at the time

petitioner filed her charge

of discrimination with the EEOC,

respondent was paying her

less for each week's work

than it paid male employees and

that it did so

because of her sex.

The question for the court

is whether that treatment,

because of sex, constituted

a violation of Title VII.

- I went to the Supreme Court,

and I looked up on the beach,

and there's that Justice

Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

- Title VII of the

Civil Rights Act of 1964

outlawed discrimination

on the basis

of race, national origin,

religion, and sex.

The employer knew

that every woman

is being paid less

than every man.

Why isn't that sufficient

under Title VII?

- [Man] Justice Ginsburg,

Title VII allows proof

of dissimilar

treatment as evidence

of present intentional

discrimination,

but it's not the

elements of the client.

- I continued to believe

and I continued to hope

that when that verdict came out,

that it would be in my favor.

- [John] Justice Alito has

our opinion this morning

in case 05-1074.

- [Samuel] A jury returned

a verdict in her favor

on the Title VII claim,

but the 11th circuit,

applying our precedence,

held that Ledbetter

had filed her EEOC

charge too late.

We therefore affirm the

judgment of the 11th circuit.

[somber music]

- Because of a procedural

interpretation of

employment law,

a majority of the Supreme

Court said that Lilly Ledbetter

could not bring her case

because her time had expired.

Now, Justice Ginsburg had

had her own experiences

with pay discrimination.

When she was at

Rutgers, she was told,

"We couldn't possibly

pay you what we pay a man

because your husband

makes a good salary."

- When Justice Ginsburg

read that dissent,

that changed everything totally.

- [Ruth] Four members

of this court,

Justices Stevens,

Souter, Breyer,

and I dissent from

today's decision.

In our view, the court

does not comprehend

or is indifferent

to the insidious way

in which women can be victims

of pay discrimination.

This is not the

first time this court

has ordered a cramped

interpretation

of Title VII incompatible

with the statute's

broad remedial purpose.

Today, the ball again

lies in Congress's court

to correct this

court's parsimonious

reading of Title VII.

- Earlier this week,

Lilly Ledbetter wrote

to the entire

Congress, and I quote,

"I am still fighting

for all the other women

and girls out there

who deserve equal pay

and equal treatment

under the law."

[audience applauds]

- [Man] Ladies and gentlemen,

the president of

the United States,

accompanied by Mrs.

Lilly Ledbetter.

[audience cheers and applauds]

- I knew walking down that hall

that that was going

to change the country,

and it was going to change

the life of a lot of people.

- Making our economy work

means making sure it works

for everybody, that there

are no second class citizens

in our workplaces, and

that it's not just unfair

and illegal, it's bad for

business to pay somebody less

because of their gender

or their age or their race

or their ethnicity,

religion, or disability.

[audience cheers and claps]

[moving instrumental music]

- Justice Ginsburg

loves this example

because it's a dialogue between

the branches of government.

Her goal was to build consensus.

Her famous friendship

with Justice Scalia,

I believe, is also a measure

of her commitment to reaching

across the aisle and working

with people out of a belief

that the court is a

sacred institution

and it works better when

there's a sort of collegiality.

You can agree or disagree

without being disagreeable.

- If you've ever met

Justice Ginsburg,

you would know that she's an

incredibly soft-spoken person.

She's very savvy, but Marty

is the more ebullient half

of that pairing.

Whenever there was a

birthday in chambers,

Marty would make some

out of this world dessert

of some sort, and

we would have tea

and dessert in the

justices' chambers.

It was very nice.

And then we also had

dinner at her apartment,

and Marty cooked,

which was a real treat.

[bright lilting

instrumental music]

He was a wise cracker,

a chronic, incorrigible

wise cracker,

and that was their shtick

was he was the funny one,

she was the straight one,

and that's how they behaved.

[somber piano music]

- Marty was my

biggest supporter.

He gave me the courage to

believe I could do things

that I wasn't sure

I was able to do.

- Marty Ginsburg made sure

that the president knew

about just one judge on

the DC circuit at that time

who had made enormous

contributions to the law,

particularly for women.

- She wouldn't be

on the Supreme Court

if it weren't for Marty.

He was her campaign manager.

He really managed a war

room, and I was part

of the war team trying

to get people to weigh in

and write letters to make

sure that those people

were run down and gathered up.

- I think that having another

woman in the Supreme Court

is central to the importance

of what's going on today,

and I think that

Judge Ginsburg's sex

is not irrelevant.

- Weinberger versus Wiesenfeld

was a landmark decision

in the quest for equal

rights for men and women.

I wish to see this committee

confirm Judge Ruth

Bader Ginsburg

to the United States

Supreme Court.

[slow poignant music]

- I have a feeling probably

the last thing Marty said

to Ruth was, "Hang in there.

Keep going. Just keep going.

I'll be watching."

- [Kathleen] They were

devoted to each other.

She had what people have

when their partner's gone,

figuring out who I am.

- He will be present in

my life as long as I live.

I have his portrait

in my bedroom,

and I look at it and say,

"You would probably like

what I'm doing now."

Look at the preamble

to our Constitution.

It says, "We, the people

of the United States,

in order to form a

more perfect union."

Who are we, the people,

in the beginning?

White property-owning men.

Who are we, the people, today?

The United States in

all of its diversity,

and I think the genius

of this document

that was written toward

the end of the 18th century

and has governed us

for well over 200 years

is that it is ever

becoming more perfect,

and we, the people is ever

becoming more inclusive.

- The irony of Justice

Ginsburg's time on Supreme Court

is that she has spent most

of it be a great dissenter.

[slow melancholy music]

- She dissents with an

eye towards making change,

with an eye towards

either Congress

or a future court

vindicating her position.

She dissents with a purpose.

- [Ruth] Justices

Steven, Souter, Breyer,

and I strongly descent

from today's opinion.

[echoing boom]

- [Woman] Five to four was

the Supreme Court vote.

- [Barbara] This begins to

chip away at Roe V Wade.

- [John] I have filed

a separate opinion

that Justice Ginsburg,

Justice Breyer,

and Justice Sotomayor

have joined.

We dissent from the

court's decision

to strike down a key

part of that statute.

[contemplative music]

[echoing boom]

- [Woman] It has been called one

of the biggest threats

to our democracy.

That ruling allowed

big companies,

including foreign corporations,

to spend unlimited amounts of

money to influence elections.

- [Ruth] I dissent

from today's decision.

John Thompson spent 14

years isolated on death row

before the truth came to light.

The lab reported

to the prosecutors

that the perpetrator's

blood type was B.

Thompson's blood type is O.

[discordant tense music]

[echoing boom]

- [Man] They cannot pay him

all of the years that he lost?

- [Woman] Reporters

say he should never

have been convicted

in the first place.

- Justices Breyer, Sotomayor,

Kagan, and I dissent.

[melancholy music]

- [Shana] I was following

the Supreme Court

and had been looking

towards the decision

that was gonna come out,

particularly in the

voting rights case,

Shelby County V Holder.

- [Ruth] The Voting Rights Act

addresses an

extraordinary problem,

a near century of

disregard for the dictates

of the 15th Amendment,

and Congress has taken

extraordinary measures

to meet the problem.

- She dissented from the

majority's basically striking

down one of the most

important pieces

of civil rights

legislation in our history.

[crowd singing and

chanting indistinctly]

- The great man who led the

March from Selma to Montgomery

and there called for the

passage of the Voting Rights Act

foresaw progress,

even in Alabama.

"The arc of the moral

universe is long," he said,

"but it bends toward justice,"

if there is a

steadfast commitment

to see the task

through to completion.

That commitment has been

disserved by today's decision.

- She actually had an edit,

which I find hilarious

because most people think,

"MLK, he's got this.

I'm not going to add or amend."

But she said, "If there

is a steadfast commitment

to see the task to completion."

It is vintage Ginsburg.

She's experienced enormous

sadness in her life.

She's lived through

backlashes to her life's work.

We're in the middle of

a backlash right now,

and yet she has

kept on fighting.

- I couldn't believe that

five justices had just decided

that the Voting Rights Act

was no longer necessary,

that racism had been eradicated,

and that all of these

problems of the 1960s just

didn't matter anymore in

terms of voting rights.

And her words in that

moment really spoke to me.

Basically, throwing away

the Voting Rights Act

was "like throwing

away an umbrella

in a rainstorm because

you're not getting wet."

And I just thought that

was just so perfect

in encapsulating how absurd

what the court was doing,

and that was the first

quote that I posted

on "Notorious RBG."

["William Tell Overture"]

That was the period of time

where Tumblr was most popular.

But I just didn't

have any expectation

that it was going to

explode the way that it did.

- I was just looking

at Tumblr today.

[audience laughs]

Bobblehead because

the head bobbles.

[audience laughs]

- [Unison] Ruth

Bader Ginsburg. Ooh.

[audience laughs and applauds]

[audience laughs]

- How did this happen?

[audience laughs]

- It's amazing, and to

think of me an icon at 82.

[audience laughs and applauds]

And at first, I didn't know

quite what to make of this

because I didn't even know

who Notorious BIG was.

[audience laughs and applauds]

- And that's what I think

made it so popular is that it

was this juxtaposition of these

completely different people

but also experienced hardships

in their lives and dealt

with it by pushing back and

speaking truth to power.

[soft lilting

instrumental music]

- My editor connected

me with Irin.

We agreed to work together.

- [Irin] We wanted to capture

that kind of spontaneity,

the visual lushness, and

also turn it into a story.

- What is going on that she has

become this cult figure now?

- Women are drawn to

her, and young people

in particular are drawn to her.

[muffled chatter]

- She just is who she is.

She's very confident,

very aware of herself.

- She believes in

what she believes in,

and she's gonna say it.

She's not worried about

what people think about her.

- When I became a

Supreme Court justice,

there were six

women in the Senate.

Now there are 20.

I was the second woman

on the Supreme Court,

and when Justice O'Connor

met, I was all alone.

Now I have two colleagues,

Justice Sonia Sotomayor

and Justice Elena Kagan.

People ask me,

"Well, when do you think

there will be enough?"

I'd say, "Well, when

there are nine,"

and people are aghast.

We've had nine men for most

of the country's history,

and no one thought there was

anything wrong with that.

- And I looked up at the bench

on which I sat for 25 years,

and what could I see?

I saw on the far right a woman,

on the far left side a woman

and near the middle a

woman, and it was dazzling.

[audience cheers and applauds]

- It's the first time

the public can see we

are really there,

really there to stay,

not one at a time curiosities.

[audience applauds]

At my age, you have to

take it year by year.

I know I'm okay this year,

but what will be next year?

I'm hopeful, however, because

my most senior colleague,

Justice John Paul Stevens,

stepped down at age 90.

So I have a way to go.

- [Man] A lot of people have

been expressing encouragement

that you eat more

kale, so to speak.

[audience laughs]

- The number one

thing people ask me

when I talk about Justice

Ginsburg is, "How is her health?

How's she doing?"

Then they ask, "How can

we keep her alive forever?

Can I give her a kidney?"

I hear that a lot.

[chuckles] She doesn't

need one. She's great.

She's in great shape.

- I have a personal trainer

who keeps me in shape.

We meet twice a week,

and we do 20 pushups

and then the plank,

which I think is harder,

with Bryant Johnson, my

trainer, my trainer since 1999.

[upbeat lively music]

I attribute my wellbeing

the two hours a week

when I devote to that.

- Let's get fully

ripped and exploded.

Let's get shredded.

Let's get stupid strong.

- Let's go.

- [Neil] Judging from

her push-up regimen,

she is not done.

Justice, welcome.

[audience applauds]

- The term just

ending was momentous.

Our docket included far

more than the usual number

of high-profile disputes.

But topping the headline news

at our closing conference,

Justice Kennedy announced his

retirement effective today.

Counting his years as a judge

of the US Court of Appeals

for the 9th Circuit,

he has served on the federal

judiciary for 43 years.

[audience applauds]

- How has the court changed

over the quarter century

that you've served on it?

How is it different

than when you started?

- Well, one thing

that isn't different

is the collegiality of the

court, and that remains.

Of course, I miss my

favorite sparring partner,

Justice Scalia,

[soft poignant music]

but you don't see that kind

of friendship existing

in our Congress anymore.

It once did.

I hope it will again.

There was a great man once

said "that the true symbol

of the United States

is not the bald eagle.

It is the pendulum.

And when the pendulum swings

too far in one direction,

it will go back."

I grew up at the

time of World War II.

The irony was we were

fighting a war against racism,

and yet by an executive

order of President Roosevelt,

people who had

done nothing wrong

except they were of

Japanese ancestry,

were interned in camps

far from their homes.

That was a dreadful mistake.

Well, I would say that we

are not experiencing the best

of times, but my

dream is that we

will get back to it one day.

I think it will

take a strong people

from both parties to say,

"Let's get together and work

for the good of the country."

Let's try in the

aisle. Yes, yes.

- If you could predict,

how many more years

do you think it'll be until

a woman becomes president?

- [Ruth] How many do you think?

- The year?

- Year? [laughs]

- Well, I will predict that it

will happen in your lifetime.

I'm not certain it

will happen in mine,

but I will make a prediction

that it will happen,

that you will see a woman as

president of the United States.

[soft poignant music]

- Recognizing that this

is probably the last time

that the American people

will ever have a chance

to glimpse you as a

person and what you

would like them to think most

of all when they think of you?

- As someone who

cares about people

and does the best she can

with the talent she has

to make a contribution

for a better world.

[soaring moving music]

- How long was you working

at the Supreme Court?

- How long have you been

working at the Supreme Court?

- Almost 24 years.

[kid gasps loudly]

[audience laughs]

- I found it the most popular

question on a college campus,

young women want to know

what kind of tires do I buy?

Don't buy Goodyear.

- He never paid me. I never

received my dollar to this day.

We still talk, but I

never received my dollar.

- I've argued five times

in the Supreme Court.

Justice Ginsburg asks

terrific questions.

They always go to the

very heart of the case.

I just wish sometimes she

would speak a little bit louder

when she was asking

her questions.

- Professor Nabokov of

changed the way I read,

and he changed the way I write.

Even when I'm drafting opinion,

thinking how the word order

should go I remember him.

- [Man] Is there a reason

why you prefer

gender discrimination

instead of sex discrimination?

- In the 70s when I was writing

briefs, I had a secretary,

and she said, "I've been typing

this word, sex, sex, sex,

and let me tell you.

Use the word gender.

It will ward off

distracting associations."

[audience laughs]

- The analogy is apt in

that both Thurgood Marshall

with Ruth Bader Ginsburg

were using the law

in a creative way to

advance civil rights.

- My dear mother-in-law

gave me some counsel.

She said, "Remember that

in every good marriage,

it helps sometimes to be

a little hard of hearing."

[audience laughs and applauds]

[pleasant lilting music]

- Your marriage is one reason

we decided to give it a shot.

- Equal Rights Amendment was

intended to prevent government

from slotting a person

solely on the basis of sex.

The amendment arms the judiciary

with a bedrock principle.

all men and all

women are entitled

to equal justice under law.

Thank you.

[audience applauds]