Ruth Bader Ginsburg recalls her upbringing during the Great Depression, lessons from her mother, becoming interested in law while attending college during Mccarthyism, and why her marriage made going to Harvard Law School acceptable to her family. Justice Ginsburg discusses how she became involved in legal issues for Women’s Rights, and details her nomination to the Supreme Court.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg was born in Brooklyn, New York, March 15, 1933. She married Martin D. Ginsburg in 1954, and has a daughter, Jane, and a son, James. She received her B.A. from Cornell University, attended Harvard Law School, and received her LL.B. from Columbia Law School. She served as a law clerk to the Honorable Edmund L. Palmieri, Judge of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, from 1959–1961. From 1961–1963, she was a research associate and then associate director of the Columbia Law School Project on International Procedure. She was a Professor of Law at Rutgers University School of Law from 1963–1972, and Columbia Law School from 1972–1980, and a fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences in Stanford, California from 1977–1978. In 1971, she co-founded the Women’s Rights Project of the American Civil Liberties Union, and served as the ACLU’s General Counsel from 1973–1980, and on the National Board of Directors from 1974–1980. She served on the Board and Executive Committee of the American Bar Foundation from 1979-1989, on the Board of Editors of the American Bar Association Journal from 1972-1978, and on the Council of the American Law Institute from 1978-1993. She was appointed a Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in 1980. President Clinton nominated her as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, and she took her seat August 10, 1993. Justice Ginsburg died on September 18, 2020.

From the 2013 PBS Documentary “Makers: Women Who Make America”, examines how women have helped shape America over the past 150 years, striving for a full and fair share of political power and economic opportunity.

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Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, 1993 - 2020

00:00 Intro
00:09 Messages from her mother
01:30 Childhood
02:24 Dreams for the future
03:30 Celia Bader’s education
04:05 Celia’s dream for her daughter
04:50 Becoming interested in the law
07:05 Pursuing a career in the law
08:04 Attending law school while raising a child
08:19 Attending Harvard Law School
10:27 Treatment of women at Harvard Law School
12:36 Struggles of being a woman at Harvard Law School
13:45 Solidarity among female law students
13:57 Life after law school
17:47 Teaching at Rutgers Law School
19:50 Discrimination against pregnant women
21:45 Becoming interested in women’s rights
25:56 Fighting women’s rights
30:44 Reed v. Reed
34:18 Learning about Reed v. Reed working with Melvin Wolf ACLU
34:43 Legal strategy behind fighting for women’s rights
39:31 The art of the possible
42:45 Arguing her first Supreme Court case
44:47 Winning her first case
46:03 Being appointed to the Supreme Court
47:33 A victory for women’s rights
48:25 Appointment to the Supreme Court
51:27 Life on the Supreme Court
52:19 Appointing more women to the Supreme Court
53:01 Virginia Military Institute lawsuit
55:10 Philadelphia High School for Girls
56:24 Marriage and Martin
59:19 Martin as a father
01:03:04 Feminism today
01:05:52 Most useful advice

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