[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 174 (Tuesday, October 6, 2020)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E931-E932]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    IN HONOR OF RUTH BADER GINSBURG

                                 ______
                                 

                           HON. JACKIE SPEIER

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                        Tuesday, October 6, 2020

  Ms. SPEIER. Madam Speaker, the loss of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is 
a loss for our country, but the grief is particularly acute for women 
and girls. We've lost the greatest feminist icon of our time who used 
her legal talents to lift us up and fought for a world that recognized 
our equal stature and dignity.
  Her fame sort of crept up on her. Her tiny frame belied her judicial 
might. She had a soft

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voice but was a megaphone in her words. She was a rock of righteousness 
and boasted rock solid abs from her planks and exercise regimen. She 
also became a fashionista icon as she donned collar necklaces and black 
lace gloves.
  As women members of Congress, our paths would have been even tougher 
had it not been for Justice Ginsburg's brilliant legal strategy that 
built a foundation for our equality in the law. She turned the personal 
sex discrimination she endured into a life's mission to overcome.
  Imagine being told by the dean of the law school at Harvard that she 
was taking a man's seat! After serving on both Harvard and Columbia's 
law reviews and graduating first in her class, she couldn't get a 
clerkship or an associate job at a New York law firm. She went on to 
teach as a professor of law at Rutgers and discrimination struck 
again--she found out she was making less than a male colleague of equal 
standing. When she complained, she was told that he had a wife and two 
kids and she had a husband in a big law firm in New York City.
  She was going to file an EEOC complaint until the law school 
relented. She argued 300 gender discrimination cases in her career 
later practicing law. She challenged bogus laws that claimed to protect 
women but in fact discriminated against them, stating, ``The pedestal 
upon which women have been placed has all too often, upon closer 
inspection, been revealed as a cage.'' In her work on the bench she 
declared women should not be discriminated against, denied control of 
our bodies, and deserved equal pay for equal work.
  The fact that we cannot honor this titan properly because Republicans 
refuse to honor her dying wish adds further insult to our collective 
injury. Their desire to destroy the ACA and rip away health care from 
135 million Americans with preexisting conditions is greater than their 
sense of decency. Their thirst to pack the court with four Justices 
selected by Presidents who lost the popular vote is anything but just.
  Her fervent wish, our fervent wish may be denied but no one can deny 
the notorious RBG her due, her greatness, her iconic presence in the 
Supreme Court hall of fame. Someday, her fervent wish of nine women 
Justices will be a reality.
  And so, we rise up. We fight for RBG's legacy and the just world she 
envisioned. It's time for us all to be notorious.

                          ____________________