Transcripts For CSPAN Discussion With Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg 20180204

Badere Court Justice Ruth Ginsberg said she has to plans offered some career advice for young women. This is just under a hour and a half. [crowd noise] rabbi holtzblatt good evening. Welcome. My name is rabbi lauren holtzblatt. What is your name . [laughter] we are absolutely thrilled to have you here tonight. [applause] we primarily measure our increasing growth not by how many people walked through the doors, but by the capacity and openness of our hearts. Our hearts has four chambers. Four core practices that obligate us. We are loving kindness in which we take care of each other at every stage in life. We are justice in which were obligated to redefine the very we of who is in this world. These walls may protect us but mostly theyre meant to come down so there can be all of us. We are prayer. We pray like our life depends on it and we work first fiercely is as if our prayers do not matter. Lastly, we are sacred text. We never stop plumbing their depths of it wisdom that continues to and the middle. Rabbi holtzblatt you dont have to be a member to join us. Just come. Join us for meditation and prayer, come and have a conversation and coffee. We actually have good coffee. So, you came here tonight for Justice Ginsburg, a hero, an absolute hero. [applause] rabbi holtzblatt we could not think of someone to be with us at this particular time were experiencing in our country. It is a dark moment. She represents everything we want to be fighting for. For those that are marginalized, for a womans voice and the public sphere, of the Justice System for equity it any quality. For everything that we hold dear. For the second time, its an embarrassment of riches. For the second time we welcome pertinent to this. We relinquish it out of love and deep respect of who she is and what she brings into the world. I would like to introduce kathleen who sits on the board who herself is a remarkable human being, an incredible lawyer who has been fighting for equity and womens rights for over 30 years. Welcome. [applause] kathleen i would like i guess you have been welcomed, i just want to say a word about the forward what 120 years of fearless, progressive Workplace Fairness advocating journalism the forward has been for the last 120 years and counting. The forward is a mainstay of the progressive jewish community. We are here to celebrate that. I want to give a shout out to rachel. Can you stand up for a minute . [applause] Kathleen Rachel was the publisher of the forwarder. Jane eisner, this is a womanled organization. [applause] kathleen f youve ever heard an argument in the United States Supreme Court, you know that too is a woman led organization. Id like to ask Ruth Ginsburg and jane to come out before i say a few words about them. [applause] [cheering] [applause] thank you so much, but please be seated. I could say an awful lot about Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Ive had a lot of alternative plans, but yesterday, there was a prayer for ruth published. Did you happen to read it . You have been traveling. Its very short and i would like to read it. At a time as disquieting as this, when so many of us feel deflated, shaken, worried for the future, when we almost cant remember what its like to go a day without namecalling, without lies, harshness or callousness, when we are nostalgic for those years of complete sentences, dignified statesmanship, acts of empathy, we still look to you, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, yeshiva girl turned legendary justice, rbg icon, fighter for the powerless and wronged. May you go from strength to strength because you have been hours. May you live many more years because you make the world brighter, fairer, kinder, because we need you. Youve helped us remain clear not just on the foundational principles of the nation, but on our jewish mandate to welcome the stranger and never stand idly by. The hebrew words in your office while in calligraphy read, justice, justice shall thou pursue. And you are certainly a justice who has pursued. You have and will keep trying, god bless Ruth Bader Ginsburg. [applause] and welcome jane eisner, the intrepid editor of the forward, my friend, my icon. Im happy to welcome both of you. [applause] thank you to everyone coming here. To those of you watching on facebook, we welcome you. It is such a thrill and a pleasure for me on behalf of my colleagues to participate in such an important event. In the last few weeks weve asked forward readers to send us their questions for Justice Ginsburg. The response has been overwhelming. We heard from readers across the country and overseas as well. Tonight i will quote from some of these questions in our conversation because they are brilliant and funny and a powerful reflective and how interested americans are in the United States Supreme Court and especially in this supreme Court Justice. I want to say at the outset that Justice Ginsburg has asked that we not discuss issues that are before the court or may be before the court. Of course, we are respecting that. Happily, there are so many other topics to talk about. Justice ginsburg, many readers of ours are interested in your jewish life and identity. And how it shaped your judicial career and your outlook. As we sit in this beautiful sanctuary, it seems like a good place to start. You grew up in brooklyn. A family that was not devout but very identified. Youve described your own mother, your beloved mother, lighting candles on friday nights and i have heard how you enjoyed celebrating passover with your family. He remarked that the four questions was the best part of the seder. Im wondering why. Justice ginsburg the youngest child is asking about this evening in this celebration. Why is passover night different from all other nights . The child is asking a question and the rest of the seder is to answering the childs question. I think it is just one of many illustrations of how jews are learning and want children to be welleducated. A couple of years ago with a rabbi you wrote about the heroic and visionary women in the passover story. Im wondering did you notice that when you were a girl . Or was that the kind of thing emerged later in life for you . The recognition of the role of women in the story . Justice ginsburg i think growing up i might have been known about mariam and moses mother, but i didnt know about midwives and pharaohs daughter, but there were no women in it. That is true. And so, you worked to make a difference in that regard. I understand that that was something you were aware of as a girl as well. Your limitations. The boys were having bar mitzvahs and girls were not. Your mother had very strict orthodox upbringing. Im wondering how that experience of being a girl at a time when girls and women had very little or no role in religious life, how did that affect you . Did it inspire you or was it something you wanted to change . Justice ginsburg of course i wanted to change it. I wanted a big party and get all those presents. I grew up with a cousin. We lived in the same household, two sisters married two brothers and we were like twins. He was bar mitzvahed and had this great party. He had all these gifts. I was very jealous. Later on in life ive read that you trace the jewish presence on the Supreme Court beginning with justice brandeis, but with judah benjamin, the first jew to be offered a seat in the United States Supreme Court. But who declined. In fact, he became the leader of the confederacy. Im wondering why do you start there in thinking about the jewish presence on the court . Justice ginsburg i dont think of benjamin as present on the court. They come in all sizes and shapes. Some are very good and some are not so good. Benjamin is an interesting character. Did have a jewish upbringing but out of the faith and his story is intriguing. He rose to the top of the ranks in the confederacy. The reason he turned down the appointment was he had just been chosen by the louisiana legislator to be the senator. Were days before the 17th amendment, so senators were chosen by the state legislature and not by direct vote. He thought all things considered, being a senator was a better job for him. He may have envisioned that if he had been on the court it wouldnt have been too many years before he had to resign. We have a question. Justice ginsburg i want to Say Something more. Although he was a leader of the confederacy, he was a slaveholder. He was subject to virulent antisemitism by others high in the ranks of the confederacy. They referred to him as judas iscariot. And i know we ran a story about confederate monuments because theres so much controversy but there is no monument to him even though he was leader of the confederacy. It may be because of what you just said, that he was treat ed among the other confederate leaders. Justice ginsburg they did have an exhibition about benjamin, and the museum in portland. Justice ginsburg justice it . Have you seen yes. Ce ginsburg i have a question from michael, a reader in georgia. He wondered how your jewishness has affected your lifes work as a lawyer, a law professor of a feminist, and a supreme Court Justice. Justice ginsburg perhaps i should start by saying i grew up in the shadow of world war ii and we came to know more and more of what was happening to the jews in europe. The sense of being an outsider, of being one of the people who had suffered oppression for no sensible reason, being a it makes you empathetic to other people who were not insiders, i would say that, and the love of learning. The sense of being a Minority Group that somehow has survived generations and generations. Of hatred and plundering. But i think of my own family. Father came to russia when he was 13. He never went to school in any country. My mother was the first person in her large family born in the usa. She was born four months after her mother arrived here. So she was conceived in the old world and born in the new world. Both of them, more than anything else wanted me to have a good education. That was number one on their list of what i should have. You mentioned growing up in the shadow of world war ii and the holocaust. Im wondering if that shaped your views of human rights and human rights law . Justice ginsburg its certainly a large part of it. I think you probably know that the holocaust was the beginning of the end of apartheid in america. We were fighting a war against odious racism and our own troops were rigidly separated by race. So when we are fighting a war against racism, how long could segregation in our own country persist . So i consider world war ii one of the major propelling forces to the brown v. Board of education education. So you see a connection between that and then what many of those africanamerican soldiers faced coming back to the states after they fought and came back as essentially secondclass citizens. Justice ginsburg yes. That is so interesting. You feel secure now as a jew, i sense. The beautiful poem we heard referenced the artwork that is on the walls of your chamber. Im wondering in your time on the court, how has it accommodated jewish tradition . Has that changed while you have been there . Justice ginsburg there hadnt been a jewish presence for some years until my appointment. The clerk of the Supreme Court came to see me very early on in my tenure and said im glad youre here because you can help me with the problem. The Supreme Courts admits lawyers to the Supreme Court are. Every year they would get half a dozen or more complaints from Orthodox Jews who said were so proud of our membership in the Supreme Court bar, but we cannot frame our certificate and put it on the wall because it says in the year of our lord so and so, and hes not our lord. I spoke to the chief about this. He said we will take it up in conference. [laughter] Justice Ginsburg in one of my colleagues whose name i will not discussed said in the year of our lord it was good enough for brandeis and goldberg and before he got there i said it is not good enough for ginsberg. [applause] Justice Ginsburg it took a while for the cycle to complete. At first they said for the Orthodox Jews we will have in the year so and so. We liked when it set on the certificate of the independence of the United States. So please keep that on our certificate. A certificate your membership in the Supreme Court, you have no choice. You can have just the year 2018, in the year of our lord or the independence of the United States. This is the way it should be. It is your choice what you want [applause] Justice Ginsburg that next was the great controversy. Sometimes they overlapped. So Justice Breyer and i asked Justice Kagan was not yet on the court. We asked the chief if the court could defer the sitting day. And the First Response was wait and confer on good friday and nobody complains about that. I would be happy to come thursday that week. Then the argument that was not really convincing for the chief was inevitably in a session there will be jewish lawyers. They worked so hard on this case. Do you want to take away from them the opportunity to present their case and require them to have a substitute . That resonated, and so now we dont sit on high holy days. [applause] one of our readers from cambridge, massachusetts, had an interesting question. He noted that you once described an opinion by israeli justice that forbid torture, even in what they call the ticking time bomb situation. You said you thought that opinion had tremendous persuasive value. Im wondering as an American Jewish jurist, do you feel any affinity for the work of the israeli Supreme Court . Justice ginsburg i feel a special affinity to the work of barack, hes one of the most brilliant jurists of our time. As you know, israel does not have a constitution. They have five basic laws. The israeli Supreme Court has a wealth of law to draw on. They have Ottoman Empire law, they have the heritage from the united kingdom. They have jewish law. The case that you mentioned, the socalled ticking bomb case, presented to the israeli Supreme Court this question, the police have apprehended a suspect they believe to know when and where a bomb is going off. Can we use extreme means, a euphemism for torture, to extract that information . In a very eloquent judgment written by thenpresident of the israeli Supreme Court, the answer was clear. Torture, never. And the opinion explained that there is no greater gift we can give to our enemy than to become so overwhelmed by our concern for security that more and more we come to resemble our enemy in our disrespect for human rights. [applause] i wonder if we can turn to your personal history for moment. Your sister, your only sibling, died when she was six and you were less than twoyearsold. Your mother was stricken with cancer during your first year of high school. And sadly died two days before your graduation. Im wondering how this affected your sense of wanting to support women and girls. And, in particular, i understand how much of an inspiration your mother was. Im wondering if you can tell us a little bit about that. Justice ginsburg my mother was a hugely intelligent woman. She emphasized two things. One was that i should be a lady, and by that she did not mean fancy dress. What she meant is be in control of your emotions and dont give way to anger, to remorse, to envy. Those emotions just sap strength enable you to move forward. And her other message was, be independent. I suppose she hoped that someday i would meet and marry prince charming. Nevertheless, she emphasized the importance of being able to fend for myself. And you did marry your prince charming, right . Marty ginsberg, your long time partner. But early in your marriage there was more adversity. He was stricken, very sick with cancer. You yourself have battled it twice. As a reader asked, how do you keep going under such challenging circumstances . Where do you draw your strength . Justice ginsburg i think the hardest time was when marty had testicular cancer. There was no chemotherapy, and there was massive surgery and daily radiation. But we got through each day and were thankful that we had it. We never thought anything other than that he would live as he did, and i was inspired when i had pancreatic cancer by marilyn who isgreat mentor. And when she was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer that was her attitude, i will live. Shes still very much alive. Wow, that is amazing. If i could turn to your long and admirable championing of gender equality. Noe you have discussed those early cases in the public before, i wonder if you might share with our audience tonight just one of your favorite cases, the one thing you feel has had the most impact in this new field. Justice ginsburg before i answer that question, i brought along there was not too much to inspire young woman in my days, there was nancy drew and that was just about it. But i read something by a very young woman. She is barely 15 when she wrote it. If i can find it here, id like to read it to you. So as i said, these are the words of a young woman just turning 15. One of the many questions that has often bothered me is why women have been, and still are thought to be so inferior to men. Its easy to say its unfair, but thats not good enough for me. Id like to know the reason for this great injustice. Men presumably dominated women from the very beginning because of the greater physical strength. It is men who earn a living and beget children and do as they please. Until recently women silently went along with this, which was stupid. The longer it is kept up, the more deeply entrenched it becomes. Fortunately, education, work and progress have opened womens eyes. In many countries they have been granted equal rights. Many people, mainly women, but also men now realize how wrong it was to tolerate this state of affairs for so long. The letter is signed, yours, anne m. Frank. One of the last entries made in her diary. I think this audience knows she was born in the netherlands in 1929, and she died in 1945, while in prison. Just three months short of her 16th birthday. Isnt that amazing that a child would write such a thing . It really is. Im so glad you brought that up. I think we overlook that aspect of her writing and her diary. Wow. Thank you. Well, a lot of Justice Ginsburg you asked about the gender discrimination. To pick a favorite is a little like asking me which of my four grandchildren and two step i think to n, but the arbitraririness of genderbased discrimination. Steven wisenfelds story is as good as any. He was married to a woman who taught in a public high school. She earned a little more money than he did. She had a healthy pregnancy. She taught into the ninth month. At the hospital, the doctor came out and told steven, you have a healthy baby boy but your wife died of an embolism. Steven decided at that moment that he would personally care for his infant, that he would not work fulltime until the child was in school fulltime. He had heard about something called child in care benefits that Social Security afforded. He went down to the local Social Security office and he said, id like to apply for child in care benefits. The benefits were arranged so that you could earn up to a certain amount and still get the benefits. Once you went above that amount, your benefit was reduced dollarfordollar. But steven thought that with the Social Security benefits and his parttime earnings he could just about make it. He was told by an attendant at the Social Security office, these are mothers benefits and not available to fathers. 1970s now, early and steven wisenfeld writes a letter to the editor of his local edison, new jersey, newspaper. It goes like this. I hear a lot these days about womens lib. Let me tell you my story. He tells what happen at the Social Security office and his tagline was, does Gloria Steinem know about this . I was teaching at rutgers at the time. A woman who taught on the faculty lived in the same town, read the letter, called stephen and suggested that he contact the new jersey affiliate of the American Civil Liberties union and that is how his case began. The court issued a unanimous judgment, but they divided three ways in the rationale. So most of them, led by Justice Brennan, said this is a typical case of the discrimination women encountered. Paula wisenfeld paid the same Social Security taxes as a man would pay, but her taxes didnt net her family the same benefits that a mans did. And then a few of them thought, this is discrimination against a male as a parent, because the law tells him you have no choice. You have to be a fulltime earner. You have to hire a substitute to take care of your child. And then one who later became my chief, then justice rhenquist, said it is totally arbitrary from the point of view of the baby. Why should the baby have the opportunity for care of a sole surviving parent when the parent who died is male but not when she is female . So, everybody was hurt by this arbitrary genderbased discrimination. The woman who is the wage earner, the male as parent, and the baby. Theres a lovely metaphor in that, actually, because it seems that hello. Justice ginsburg we need technical assistance. [laughter] theres a lovely metaphor in that, that sort of explains Justice Ginsburg is it coming across . No. Can barely hear anything. [applause] i feel like theres a lovely metaphor in that sort of triumvirate of answers in that it shows that gender equality is actually for men and for women and for children. Did you see it that way . Justice ginsburg very much so. Thats how we argued it. Wow. [applause] so around that time, in 1973, you delivered a fullthroated support for the equal rights amendment, which at that time had passed both houses of congress but was never ratified by enough states to become part of the constitution. Im just wondering, do we need an e. R. A. Now, especially in this me too moment . Justice ginsburg first i should say that our constitution is powerfully hard to amend. After congress it takes threequarters of the states to ratify, and the e. R. A. Fell three states short. People ask me questions like the one you asked, havent women progressed under the 14th amendments equalprotection clause to get you to the point where you would be if there were an equal rights amendment . And my answer is, perhaps, but then i take out my pocket constitution [laughter] and say, i have three granddaughters. I can fill this constitution on fundamental instruments of government and point to the first amendment, guaranteeing freedom of speech, press, religion. I would like them to see in the constitution a statement that men and women are persons of equal citizenship stature. Id like to see that as a basic tenet of our system. Every constitution in the world written since the year 1950 has an equivalent of an equalrights amendment, a statement that men and women are persons equal in dignity and in right. Our constitution starts out, we, the people, in order to form a more perfect union. And i think part of becoming, a very large part of becoming a more perfect union, is to embrace more and more people. Think of how it was in the beginning in 1787 when the original constitution was written. So who are we the people . I would not have been there. Half the population would not have been there. The people who were held in human bondage, native americans were not part of the political constituency. But over, now, well over two centuries, i think the genius of the constitution is that this concept of we, the people has become ever more embracing, and so i would like to see an amendment in our constitution so equalrights that [applause] and im still hopeful theres some movement in congress to revive the amendment. You have spoken recently about your own me too moment which happened years ago, and one of our readers wondered whether you still experience sexism today. Not that kind of sexism. [laughter] im soon going to be 85, so but is there lingering bias . I think in the decade of the 1970s most of the explicit genderbased classifications were gone, a combination of legislatures changing, courts issuing decisions. It was a conversation between the courts and the legislature to accomplish that change, getting rid of almost all of the explicit genderbased lines. What is left is what has been called unconscious bias. And my best example of that is the symphony orchestra. When i was growing up i never saw a woman in a symphony orchestra, except perhaps for a harpist. A wellknown music critic for the New York Times swore he could tell whether its a woman playing or a man, the piano, the violin. One day someone decided to put him to the test, so they sat him down and blindfolded him and then they had a progression of Young Artists come out and perform. And he was all mixed up. So then, someone came up with the brilliant idea, lets drop the curtain so that the judges of the competition would not see the people who were auditioning. And with that, almost overnight, there was a change in the composition of symphony orchestras. A young violinist, when i told this story at a Music Festival some years ago, said, you left out something. And i said, what did i leave out . You left out that we auditioned shoeless so they wont hear a womans heels coming. [laughter] now, unfortunately we cant replicate the dropped curtain in every area of endeavor. There is a wonderful, slim volume, its two lectures by mary beard, in which she explains the first one is about womens voicelessness, and the second is women in power, but she starts with the story of penelope coming down to where the suitors are and the first son telling her, mother, you are not supposed to speak in public. Women dont speak in public. Post this is in homers odyssey. Justice ginsburg yes. I dont know how many time i attended meetings as a young faculty member, and where i would Say Something and it was silence and then the discussion went on, and then maybe 1015 minutes later a man would say just what i had said, and there would be a reaction. [laughter] good idea. There was a tendency to tune out when a woman was speaking because you couldnt expect her to say anything worthwhile. Post well, in fact, this condition really might be continuing. I found a study in 2015 of the womens supreme Court Justices, so that would be you and justices kagan and sotomayor, that you were interrupted threetimes more often than your male colleagues. Now, this was an academic study. Does that ring true to you . Does it mean anything . Justice ginsburg i think the academic study is accurate if you look at the transcripts. Im glad that that report came out because i think things will change. [laughter] men will be more conscious that this is happening. On the other side, i cant say that we have been so good about not interrupting. [laughter] when Justice Scalia was alive, it was a competition between sotomayor and scalia to see who could ask the most questions in an oral argument. [laughter] host so many Justice Ginsburg let me tell you another story, its a very jewish story. So one day in argument Justice Oconnor was asking a question, and then i jumped in and she said, just a minute. Im not finished. Next day in a usa today headline, rude ruth interrupts sandra. [laughter] at lunch immediately after i apologized to sandra and she said, ruth, dont worry about it at all. The guys do it to each other all the time. [laughter] so when i was asked my reaction to the article, my response was, reaction to the article, thats what my response was. The reporter who wrote the story watched for the next two argument sessions and said, she is right. I never noticed it when the men are interrupting each other. Then a woman came to my rescue from georgetown, a great expert in language, and she tried to explain how was it that i came to interrupt sandra. Well, Justice Sandra day oconnor is from a ranch on the border between new mexico and arizona, a laidback gal from the west. And i am a fasttalking jewish girl from new york. [laughter] well, people who know the two of us, know that sandra got out two words for my every one, but that was the speech. [laughter] meant well, but an illustration of jews are fast talking, prone to interrupting each other. Host so many of our leaders, men and especially women, are really hungry for your advice. Here is becky from raleigh, north carolina. She says she has been working as a paralegal for only a few months and has already faced discrimination. She wants to pursue her dream of a legal career. What advice would you give her . Justice ginsburg first, find allies. Being a loner is hard, but if you have other people with you, your own up confidence and spirit. And dont respond to an insult that you have experienced by saying, you sexist pig. [laughter] i thought that my job in the early 1970s was to be a kind of kindergarten teacher, to explain to judges that there really was such a thing at genderbased discrimination. It was a big difference between their understanding of Racial Discrimination and gender discrimination. It was a big difference between Racial Discrimination was odious, but discrimination between men and women, the myth was that it always operates benignly in the womans favor. So, to tell a man who thinks he has been a very good husband and a very good father that he is a discriminator, it takes an education for them to see there really is such a thing, because every time the Supreme Court met up with a genderbased classification before 1971, it rationalized it as a favor to women. Women werent put on the jury rolls. Well, that is a favor. They mustnt be distracted from their work as the center of home and family life. Never mind that it has something to say about womens citizenship. Citizens have obligations as well as rights. One obligation is to participate in the Justice System. Men are obliged to serve, but women are expendable. Or the notion that one typical law passed by the state of michigan in the 1940s, a woman could not serve as a bartender unless her husband or her father owned the establishment. [laughter] the testing case was a mother who owned a tavern and her daughter was her bartender. The Supreme Court dispatched that as legislation meant to protect the woman from unsavory places. Never mind that there was no restriction on the woman being a barmaid, that is the one who carries the drinks to the table where she didnt stand behind a bar to protect her. That was in 1948. But that was the thinking, with these classifications. It took a while for justices to understand what Justice Brennan said so well, this pedestal that women are supposed to stand on, more often than not turns out to be a cage. So that was our mission, to get judges to understand that there really was such a thing as genderbased discrimination. Post so, one of the justices that it seems you have had over the years, the warmest and most unusual relationship is the late justice antonin scalia. And there are many people who marvel at the fact that the two of you disagreed so vehemently, and yet had such a warm and deep relationship. And some of our readers asked about this. A teacher wrote in and said, her Public Policy students say they cant talk to their peers whose political views differ from their own. Another reader says its so hard to talk to family members these days, and friends who dont agree with them. I am wondering, how did you and Justice Scalia do it . Justice ginsburg the first time i met Justice Scalia, he was then professor scalia teaching at the university of chicago. I attended a lecture he gave. I disagreed with a lot of what he said, [laughter] but i was totally captivated by the way he said it. He was a man with a great sense of humor. When we became buddies on the d. C. Circuit, where the court sits in panels of three judges, and he would whisper something to me in the middle of an oral argument that would totally crack me up. [laughter] and it was all i could do to avoid bursting out in hilarious laughter. And we shared certain things. One was, he was brought up in queens and i was brought up in brooklyn, in roughly similar neighborhoods where people were either irish or italian or jewish. We both really cared about families. We had an annual new years party where the affair would be whatever was hunted, so usually it was bambi, my husband, who is a great chef, made venison and whatever children were around came. And then we shared a love of opera. In fact, there is an opera, a comic opera, called scaliaginsburg and it does a wonderful job of explaining our friendship. It starts out with scalias rage aria and it goes like this. The justices are blind. How can they possibly spout this . The constitution says absolutely nothing about this. And then i respond that he is searching for brightlight solutions to problems that dont have easy answers. But the great thing about how our constitution is that, like our society, it can evolve. Well, then scalia gets locked up in a dark room. He is being punished for excessive dissenting. [laughter] and he has to go to a through certain tests to get out. So, i enter through a Glass Ceiling [laughter] and i tell a character left over from don giovanni who in this is astonished. He said, why would you want to help him . He is your enemy. Then we sing a wonderful duet. [laughter] i say hes not my enemy. He is my dear friend. Yes, we are different, but we are one. Different in the way we approach interpretations of legal text, but one in our reverence for the constitution and for the institution we serve. We recently had excerpts from the opera, scaliaginsburg at the library of congress. The library of congress. The audience were members and staff of the house and Senate Judiciary committees. [laughter] host what did they think of that . Justice ginsburg the next day senator grassley asked if he could have a copy of my remarks. [laughter] but sometimes i would speak to Justice Scalia in private and say, this is so over the top, what you have written. Tone it down. You will be more persuasive. He never took that advice. [laughter] but he would come into my chambers and scalia was a great grammarian. His father was a latin teacher at Brooklyn College and his mother was a a gradeschool teacher. He would come into chambers, never sent a memo around so that i could be embarrassed by the mistake i made. Host do you think there are lessons in your friendship now . We are in such a polarized time and i think people really are thirsty for role models that are able to transcend, transcend their philosophical or political or judicial differences. Are there any lessons in your friendship, for us . Justice ginsburg i think it is our caring about the welfare of the court, and anybody who is in a decisionmaking body that should be the number one priority. I would say the Supreme Court is the most collegial place ive ever worked. Post really host really . Justice ginsburg on any law faculty, on the d. C. Circuit. We all respect and in most cases [laughter] i probably cant ask you to [laughter] let me tell you the way it was in the not so good old days. Justice brandeis coming on the court, the second wilson appointee. The first was justice mcreynolds. Justice mcreynolds was an out and out antisemite and when brandeis, brilliant man who was sometimes full of isaiah, when brandeis got up to speak in conference, mcreynolds would leave the room. Really . Wow. Did anyone object . Did anyone say, this is wrong . Justice ginsberg i guess in time he overcame his difficulties. Wow. So, you had a very warm and loving and quite Unusual Partnership with your late husband, marty. I understand that he was much more socially gregarious than you were for many years. He was a great cook and a raconteur. It does seem that since his passing, your public persona has grown, and i wonder if thats a coincidence or whether there is some connection there. Marty was my biggest booster all my life. We were married when the same month i graduated from college. Marty had his first year of law school. He was then taken out at the tail end of the korean war for service, so when we went back, he was in his second year, i was in my first year. And one of his classmates, someone i had known in cornell, said to me, your husband is bragging about you. He is saying youre going to be on the law review. And i look at you and you were this little twerp person. [laughter] thats the way marty was, always made me feel i was better was extraordinary for a young i went to school, cornell university, with a ratio four it was the ideal place for if you could not find your man at cornell, you were hopeless. [laughter] what made marty so overwhelmingly attractive to me is that he cared that i had a brain, and i had not met a guy before who was interested at all. And some of my classmates at cornell, very bright women, they would play dumb. That was the way to please a man, to make him feel more important. But marty was so secure in his own ability that he never regarded me as any kind of a threat, far from it. His idea was if i decided i wanted to spend the rest of my life with ruth, shes got to be something special. Its rather hard to imagine you playing down. I have to say that. [laughter] so, youre a rather famous person now, you know. And im just wondering, here you have your own swag and theres mugs and you have your tote bag, your i dissent tote bag. It is strange to see your face on mugs and tote bags . [laughter] this is all the creation of a second year law student at nyu. And it started when the Supreme Court decideed the Shelby County case that shot the heart out of the Voting Rights act of 1965. And it started when the supreme he was angry about what the court did, and then decided that anger is a useless emotion and she would do something affirmative, something positive. So she created this tumbler that starts with my dissent in the Shelby County case, and then she thought about what is the proper name. Someone suggested a fellow brooklynite, notorious b. I. G. [laughter] people about know we have that important thing in common, that we were born and bred in brooklyn, new york. It and has just taken off from there. It is amazing to me. In march i will be 85, and Everyone Wants to take my picture. [applause] so, kate mckinen plays you on saturday night live. So, kate mckinen plays you on Felicity Jones is starring as you in a new feature film, a documentary just debuted last week at sundance. How does it feel to see yourself on the screen . I have seen the documentary. It is really good. [laughter] my personal trainer is in it. The filmmakers spent an hour in the gym with the two of us, and maybe two or three minutes of it shows up in the film. The one with Felicity Jones i should give equal billing to the person who plays marty. Marty is he is taller than marty. Do you think youre the same height as Felicity Jones . Anyway, that film is called on the basis of sex, and it will be out probably at the end of 2018. The script was written by my nephew, the son of martys sister, and he based it on a case that marty and i had argued together. It is a case that didnt go to the Supreme Court, and i asked my nephew why he picked that case, and he said because he wanted the film to be as much about a marriage as it was about the legal case, and the case is very good. Its march versus the commissioner of Internal Revenue. This was a man who took good care of his mother, though she was 93. The Internal Revenue code had a deduction if you hired someone to be a substitute for yourself to take care of a child, an elderly parent, an infirm relative of any age. The deduction was available to any woman or to a widowed or divorced man. Chancey mars has never married. He took the deduction. It was disallowed. He filed his own case in the tax court. He filed his own brief, which was the sole of simplicity. It said, if i were a dutiful daughter i would have gotten this deduction. I am a dutiful son. What sense does this make . And i think the tax code says something to the effect of, we glean the taxpayer is making a constitutional argument, but everyone knows the Internal Revenue code is immune from constitutional attack. Its riddled with arbitrariness. Anyway, we took chancey mars case to the tenth circuit and argued it together in denver. The tenth circuit decided the case in our favor. Congress changed the law prospectively. That was the interplay between the court and the legislature. That legislature fixed it. Nevertheless, the solicitor general asked the Supreme Court review the decision, and explained that even though this was over, the tenth circuits decision cast a cloud of unconstitutionality over dozens of federal statutes. See appendix e. Appendix e. Was a list of every provision in the u. S. Code that differentiated on the basis of gender. Wow. It came from the department of defense computer, when no one had a personal computer, but it was a bonanza. There it was, all the provisions that needed to be changed. [laughter] so that it is the case that is at the center of the basis so that it is the case that of sex, the name of the film. So many democratic norms seem to be under assault now, undermined the media, the judiciary. Im just wondering if you think theres moment when justices should respond. The judiciary is a reactive branch of government. It doesnt generate controversies that come before it. It has no agenda. Its reactive to what is out there. A very fine federal judge, judge kohlberg from the fifth circuit, once said courts dont make conflagration, but do their best to put them out. People ask me about the opinion. I say, read it. Judges do depend on the bar to explain the importance of an independent judiciary. It is our nations hallmark and pride, the federal judiciary. Is there any decision you regret . I can answer that question by telling you the advice i was given when i was a brand new pride, the federal judiciary. Judge on the d. C. Circuit by my senior colleague. He said, ruth, you have to work hard on every case, every opinion you write, but when its released, when its over and done, dont look back. Dont waste your time worrying about what is done go on to the next case and give it your all. And that is wonderful advice for a judge. Were you able to follow that . Without any difficulty, yes. [laughter] wow. I am really impressed. I dont have the same challenge my colleagues had when they were asked about bush v gore. Over the years there has been the suggestion that the lifetime tenure of supreme Court Justices be replaced by a set term that might say span several presidencies. It might produce partisan anxiety and older judges could be selected to serve. It could be a graceful way for judges perhaps past their prime to leave the bench, and im just wondering what you think about this idea. It is a subject on which i am biased and prejudiced. [laughter] [applause] i will admit that most countries in the world have a compulsory retirement age. Most of the states have a compulsory retirement age for judges. Some have a fixed term, fixed nonrenewable term. But i am grateful to the Founding Fathers for writing into the constitution that the judges shall hold their office during good behavior. So, many people have asked me, when are you going to step down . Never. My First Response was, i had a painting on loan from the museum of american art by joseph albers, and i loved it. He took it away for me for a traveling show. Eight years later it came back. So i said, i couldnt even begin to think about leaving until i get my albers back. It came back. The next was brandeis. He was the same age as i was when he was appointed. He step down after 23 years. Having worked for 2023 years, i having worked for 2023 years, i am now the longest sitting having worked for 2023 years, i am now the longest sitting jewish justice and woman, brandeis. So i cant use that. So, im just candid and say, as long as i can do the job full steam, i will be here. [applause] well, we are sadly almost out of time. There is one question that i must ask you. If i can take a personal privilege here, a question i had the privilege of asking president obama and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and susan rice when she was National Security adviser. What is your favorite flavor of the bagel . [laughter] a new york poppy seed bagel. Oh, my gosh. I did not know this is amazing i did not know the answer to this and this may be the only thing that barack obama and Benjamin Netanyahu and Ruth Bader Ginsburg agree on. [laughter] they all pick poppyseed. Wow, i am amazed. So, of all the many questions and notes from readers that we received, one stands out and id like to quote from this in our closing. It comes from karly brown of evansville, indiana, and i hope you are watching. She is nine years old, in the fourth grade, and she says that she is your biggest fan. Her girl scout troop marched in a Christmas Parade and were fourth grade, and she says that asked to hold up signs about what they wanted to be when they grew up and her sign said, supreme Court Justice. And she wants to be a justice, she says, to support womens rights and other people who arent treated fairly. She also are you ready wants to be called c. R. B. Like you. [laughter] and here is her question. She said, what can i do now as a nineyearold to make a change . How can i follow in your footsteps . May i say first that the idea of a young girl aspiring to be a judge, even more supreme Court Justice, is a wonderful thing. I have a granddaughter who is now a lawyer. When she was eight i was being filmed for some show, and my granddaughter, clara, was with me, and she said that she wanted to be in the film, too, so the filmmaker said, all right, clara, well ask you a question. What would you like to be when you grow up . And this then eightyearold said, i would like to be president of the United States of the world. [laughter] it is a difference between the as aspirations that young women can have today and what they had in the not so good old days, but i think she should take her schoolwork very seriously, become a good reader. Reading is trembley important in the job i now hold, and do things in your community. Im sure you will find things, whether its assisting in getting food to the homeless people, or if you care about the environment, helping keep your local parks clean, many things that you can do to make things a little better in your community. So, that is what i would advise her to do. Well, she asked me to ask you to please stay on the Supreme Court until she can take your spot. [laughter] [applause] somehow i think there are people in this room who might agree. I just want to thank you all. This has been an amazing evening. Personal thanks to my dear friend, and wonderful supporter, kathleen, for the lovely introduction and for all that you did to make this happen. To the rabbis, as well as david and courtney and all the people, you are amazing. It was such a pleasure to work with you. [applause] id like to recognize the board chair, jake, and our president , sam, and the rest of the Boards National board, many of whom flew in here to washington to be here tonight. To forward readers and supporters, without your generous support, we couldnt do what we can do. And for all of you who came here tonight, and all of those who are watching on webcasts and facebook, online, thank you so much for being part of this wonderful conversation. And of course, our greatest thanks to justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. [applause] thank you so much. [applause] thank you so much. Thank you. [applause] [cheers and applause] washington to be here tonight. Thank you so much. [cheers and applause] i must ask you to please remain in your seats until the justice has exited the building, and the security personnel will then open the doors behind you. This is a perfect time to talk about all the Amazing Things we learned tonight, so thank you so much. [applause] cspans history series landmark cases returns with a look at 12 new Supreme Court cases. Each week, historians and experts join us to discuss the issues and personal stories behind the Supreme Court decisions. Beginning monday, february 26 eastern. A. M. We have a companion guide written by a veteran Supreme Court journalist. Landmark cases, eastern. Volume 2. To get your copy, go to cspan. Org. Heres a look at our live coverage on cspan. House Homeland Security chair gives a speech on National Security. The house returns after that to consider bills dealing with military sales to jordan and combating russian cyber attacks. Votes are also possible on another temporary measure to keep the government funded. On cspan2, Hillary Clinton talks about the role of women in advancing human rights. At 3 00, the Senate Returns to consider the nomination of andrew yomku to be the under secretary of commerce. A vote on the nomination will follow. On cspan3, a discussion on the current Political Climate and the impact it is having on the senate. The House Administration Committee Meets to consider a resolution that would require each lawmaker and its staff to adopt an antiharassment and antidiscrimination policy. Lindsey mcpherson reports for roll call and covers house leadership. Congress is facing another shutdown deadline thursday. You covered the republican retreat in west virginia, what did you learn about their plans to avert the next shutdown . Lindsey from the retreat itself, there did not seem to be a lot of discussion. Retreat in west virginia, what did you learn about their plans to avert the next shutdown . Even speaker ryan had said that they would nee