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Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Historical figureUnited States1933-2020

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court (1993-2020) · Judge, U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit (1980-1993)

Women's rights lawyer who won key sex-discrimination cases in the 1970s, then served 27 years as a Supreme Court justice and became the best-known liberal voice on the bench.

Compare yourself See the 12 scores
Profile on 12 axes6 of 12 documented
ECONOMYSTATESOCIETYWORLDOwnershipMarketsWelfareAuthoritySecurityStructureMoralityReligionTechnologyCultureTradeForeign
Where they stood

Ruth Bader Ginsburg, axis by axis

  1. 01OwnershipNo clear record
    PublicPrivate
  2. 02Markets-30
    PlannedFree

    This score comes from her backing for workplace anti-bias law, as in her Ledbetter dissent, and for standing in environmental cases. She did not write on economic policy as such.

  3. 03WelfareNo clear record
    SharedSelf-reliant
  4. 04Authority-55
    DemocraticStrong leader

    Her Shelby County dissent defended federal oversight of voting rules, which reads as support for democratic checks and wide access to the ballot.

  5. 05Security-55
    LibertyOrder
  6. 06Structure+30
    LocalCentral

    She generally accepted broad federal power to protect civil rights, as in Shelby County, which puts her toward the central end.

  7. 07Morality-75
    ProgressiveTraditional

    She supported abortion rights and equality for women. Even so, she faulted the reasoning of Roe v. Wade for cutting short change through legislatures.

  8. 08Religion-35
    SecularReligious

    In Burwell v. Hobby Lobby she opposed letting employers claim religious exemptions from contraception coverage. Yet she also wrote opinions that made room for prisoners' religious practice.

  9. 09TechnologyNo clear record
    EmbraceCaution
  10. 10CultureNo clear record
    MulticulturalNational identity
  11. 11TradeNo clear record
    GlobalProtected
  12. 12Foreign policyNo clear record
    CooperationStrength

6 axes have no clear record, so matching leaves them out.

Who was Ruth Bader Ginsburg?

Ruth Bader Ginsburg was born in Brooklyn in 1933. She finished at the top of her Columbia Law School class in 1959, yet she could not find a job because she was a woman. She went on to teach at Rutgers, and in 1972 became the first woman with tenure on the Columbia law faculty. At the ACLU she helped start the Women's Rights Project, and she personally argued six sex-discrimination cases at the nation's highest court. Jimmy Carter made her a federal appeals judge in Washington in 1980. Bill Clinton chose her for the Supreme Court in 1993, and senators voted 96 to 3 to confirm her. She sat on the Court until she died in September 2020.

Political views

  • In the 1970s she planned a legal campaign that included Frontiero v. Richardson and Weinberger v. Wiesenfeld, to get courts to treat laws that sort people by sex with suspicion.Source: en.wikipedia.org
  • Wrote the Court's opinion in United States v. Virginia (1996), which ended male-only admissions at the Virginia Military Institute.Source: law.cornell.edu
  • Lost Ledbetter v. Goodyear in 2007 as a dissenter and urged Congress to undo it, which it did through the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act.Source: oyez.org
  • Backed abortion rights and dissented in Gonzales v. Carhart, but argued that Roe v. Wade had halted reform being made through the states.Source: en.wikipedia.org
  • Dissented in Shelby County v. Holder (2013), where the Court struck down the formula that decided which places needed federal approval to change voting rules.Source: en.wikipedia.org
  • Sided with civil liberties in Fourth Amendment cases. She dissented in Board of Education v. Earls, which allowed drug tests at school, and in Herring v. United States.Source: en.wikipedia.org
  • Supported race-conscious admissions at universities, writing a concurrence in Grutter v. Bollinger and a dissent in Gratz v. Bollinger.Source: en.wikipedia.org

Legacy

Admirers say Ginsburg changed American law on sex discrimination, first as a litigator and later as a justice. In her last years she became a pop-culture icon under the nickname 'Notorious R.B.G.'. Conservative critics saw a dependable liberal vote who read the Constitution too broadly. Some liberals blame her for not stepping down while Democrats still ran the Senate in 2013-2014. When she died in 2020, Donald Trump filled her seat with Amy Coney Barrett. In 2016 she said sorry for comments about Trump as a candidate and for calling kneeling during the anthem 'really dumb'. Many people also remember her warm friendship with Antonin Scalia, her ideological opposite.

In their own words

“Once again, the ball is in Congress' court.”
Dissent in Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire and Rubber Co., 2007

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Ruth Bader Ginsburg: questions

Who put Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the Supreme Court?

President Bill Clinton picked her in 1993, and the Senate confirmed her 96 to 3. Earlier, in 1980, Jimmy Carter had named her to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals.

What did Ruth Bader Ginsburg do before she was a justice?

She taught law and led the fight for women's legal equality. As part of the ACLU, she argued six sex-discrimination cases at the Supreme Court during the 1970s.

Was Ruth Bader Ginsburg liberal?

Yes. She was a leading liberal voice on the Court, especially on gender equality, voting rights and civil liberties. She was also known for friendly ties with conservative colleagues.

Sources