cadets. i was in the first class of women. we were here not to break tradition, not to ruin history, but to help grow it. for those four years i worked extremely hard to be the best person i could be and to represent women as a whole. i wanted to be that person that stood in front of the men and said i can do it too. it is most appropriate that we welcome today a member of our nation s highest court and notable example of a citizen with a lifelong dedication to public service. justice ruth bader ginsburg. welcome to the virginia military institute. it wasn t just about vmi. it was about the notion that you cannot exclude women just because they re women.
as you know, it didn t work. the opinion of the court of virginia against the united states will be announced by justice ginsburg. some women can meet the physical standards vmi imposes on men, are capable of all the activities required of vmi and would want to attend vmi if they had the chance. this opinion does mark as presumptively imbalanced a law that denies to women equal opportunity to aspire, achieve, participate in and to contribute to society based on what they can do. it soon became history.
very much aware of that. and i was trying to fashion an argument that would penetrate that. mr. chief justice and may it please the court, educators are virtually united that many young men and young women significantly benefit from a same sex education. if you re defending single sex education when virginia abandoned single sex education in all schools but one. there are a number of women only schools in virginia that chose themselves to go to coeducation because of demands that occurred demands from whom? the trends that were away from single sex education. i was dealing with a very worthy and formidable force at the other side of that bench. to clarify you are defending vmi for all males and no public program for women. the effort by virginia is to promote diversity by creating opportunities for people of both sexes. that was my pitch.
gender characteristics or generalizations here, but for some young men at that time of their life they need discipline and vmi provided that. look at the men that stand before you. they represent the essence of vmi. a female high school student wanted to attend vmi so she brought a case against virginia claiming that the all-male missions policy violated equal protection. so it actually went from the district court to the appellate court before it came up to the supreme court. this was an extremely important case for justice ginsburg. it was her first womens rights case on the supreme court. the honorable, which chief justice and the associate justices of the supreme court of the united states. i was very much aware of justice ginsburg s history with respect to gender, excluding women from an institution, i was
conflict with the constitution, the constitution must prevail. vmi, a 150-year-old all-male military college that had a tremendous endowment, well-connected alumni, four star generals. when you came out that was something. the military virginia institute was the last all male state institute in the country as an all-male military academy. boys can be troublesome, full of hormones and so forth. i don t mean to make general