Civic Life

Justice Ginsburg: Pillar of American Democracy

Eboo Patel

September 20, 2020

Save perhaps President Barack Obama, there is no one who deserves the Pillar of American Democracy Award over the last half century more than Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Here’s Why:

She expanded inclusiveness

By pioneering the field of gender discrimination law, and winning a number of landmark cases, RBG did as much as anyone in the last fifty years to facilitate the fuller participation of women in American society. The exclusion of various groups, based on race, gender, sexuality, physical ability, religion, etc is amongst the great sins, and great contradictions, of American society. RBG’s contributions to this arena have been much written about, and cannot be overstated. To be a Pillar of American Democracy, you absolutely have to fight for wider inclusion.

She built genuine relationships across lines of ideological difference

Read Eugene Scalia’s reflections on the friendship between his father, Justice Antonin Scalia, and Justice Ginsburg. Justices Ginsburg and Scalia spent New Year’s Eve together, rode elephants together, went to the opera together, argued in private, argued in public, defeated one another, and consoled the other after defeat. Most importantly, they learned from the other’s perspective. In a powerful story from Ginsburg’s eulogy for Scalia, she says that he gave her his dissent in the important VMI case as early as possible so that she might have a chance to incorporate her responses to his arguments in the court’s decision. Scalia’s arguments, Ginsburg relates, were of the “this wolf comes as a wolf” variety, and, she adds, they were incisive and important. She disagreed with them, and learned from them, and it made her own decision stronger. Imagine eulogizing your ideological foe. Spending New Year’s Eve with him, year after year. More importantly, taking his arguments seriously enough that you learn from them. (For faculty, this is an interesting assignments to give students: if you were asked to eulogize an ideological opponent, what would you say about her?) A diverse democracy requires respectful friendships across lines of ideological disagreement.