“For some reason, people repeatedly have asked RBG when she thought there would be enough women on the court. The question is asinine, her answer effective: ‘Where there are nine.”
Ruth Bader Ginsburg was a champion for equal rights long before she was an Internet sensation. This biography was a lot of fun, it flavors the facts with some of the memes made of Ginsburg in the last few years. It seemed a timely read following the death of fellow Justice, Antonin Scalia, who was a close friend on RBG despite their difference of ideology.
Born in 1933, RBG was always hardworking and smart but as a woman in a “man’s world” she had a lot to overcome on her way to the bench. It’s horrifying to read about the struggles women who wanted a college degree and a career faced in the not so distant past. Ginsburg was a trailblazer and she had the support of her husband to go as far as she wanted in her career. If you think RBG is a bad ass now you have to read about her time as a young lawyer; her past was the most enlightening for me. Her time with the ACLU brought a lot of key decisions which helped shape the more equal view of men and women we have today. I’m sure she is thrilled about Lego’s recent unveiling of “Stay-at-Home Dad” and “Career Mom.”
“I have a last thank-you,” she said. “It is to my mother, Celia Amster Bader, the bravest and strongest person I have known, who was taken from me much too soon,” she said. “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.”
I loved the thought process and design of Notorious RBG; the timelines and breakdowns of her most important cases as well as her dissents made some of the more dense topics accessible. Carmon and Knizhnik did a phenomenal job honoring Ginsburg and I hope they expand their horizons to give another worthwhile subject their quirky treatment.
This book is on my the shelf waiting for me… this weekend might be its time.