[Congressional Record Volume 167, Number 213 (Thursday, December 9, 2021)]
[Senate]
[Pages S9085-S9086]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




  TO OBTAIN AND DIRECT THE PLACEMENT IN THE CAPITOL OR ON THE CAPITOL 
GROUNDS OF A STATUE TO HONOR ASSOCIATE JUSTICE OF THE SUPREME COURT OF 
 THE UNITED STATES SANDRA DAY O'CONNOR AND A STATUE TO HONOR ASSOCIATE 
 JUSTICE OF THE SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES RUTH BADER GINSBURG

  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the 
Committee on Rules and Administration be discharged from further 
consideration of S. 3294 and that the Senate proceed to its immediate 
consideration.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the bill by title.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (S. 3294) to obtain and direct the placement in the 
     Capitol or on the Capitol Grounds of a statue to honor 
     Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States 
     Sandra Day O'Connor and a statue to honor Associate Justice 
     of the Supreme Court of the United States Ruth Bader 
     Ginsburg.

  There being no objection, the committee was discharged, and the 
Senate proceeded to consider the bill.
  Mr. SCHUMER. I ask unanimous consent that the bill be considered read 
a third time and passed and that the motion to reconsider be considered 
made and laid upon the table.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The bill (S. 3294) was ordered to be engrossed for a third reading, 
was read the third time, and passed, as follows:

                                S. 3294

       Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of 
     the United States of America in Congress assembled,

     SECTION 1. FINDINGS.

       (a) Sandra Day O'Connor.--Congress finds the following:
       (1) Sandra Day O'Connor was born in 1930 in El Paso, Texas, 
     and spent her childhood on her family's isolated Arizona 
     cattle ranch. She lived with her grandmother in El Paso 
     during the school year, away from her home and parents.
       (2) O'Connor matriculated to Stanford University at the age 
     of 16, and combined her undergraduate and law school 
     curricula, graduating with a bachelor's degree in economics 
     and a law degree in just 6 years. She was third in her law 
     school class, behind William Rehnquist, her future colleague 
     on the Supreme Court of the United States (in this section 
     referred to as the ``Supreme Court'').
       (3) Despite her qualifications, O'Connor could not find 
     work as an attorney because of bias against women in the law. 
     She ended up negotiating for an unpaid position in the San 
     Mateo County District Attorney's office at a shared desk, 
     while her husband, John, finished at Stanford Law School 1 
     year later.
       (4) O'Connor traveled to Frankfurt, Germany, in 1954 with 
     her husband John, who had joined the United States Army Judge 
     Advocate General's Corps, where she was able to find work as 
     a civilian attorney with the United States Army Quartermaster 
     Corps. In 1957, O'Connor returned to Arizona and still could 
     not find work with a traditional law firm due to her gender, 
     so she ``hung out a shingle'' as a sole practitioner.
       (5) In 1965, O'Connor was hired as an Assistant Attorney 
     General for the State of Arizona.
       (6) Active in Republican Party politics and well-received 
     for her work at the Arizona State Capitol, O'Connor was 
     appointed to an Arizona State Senate seat in 1969 when the 
     incumbent, also a woman, was appointed to a Federal position 
     and vacated the office.
       (7) In 1970, O'Connor was elected to the Arizona State 
     Senate and served 2 consecutive terms. In 1972, she was 
     selected as Majority Leader of the Arizona State Senate, the 
     first time a woman held such a position in any State.
       (8) In 1974, O'Connor ran for office as a trial court 
     judge. She won and was later appointed to the Arizona Court 
     of Appeals in 1979.
       (9) On August 19, 1981, President Ronald Reagan nominated 
     O'Connor to be an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, to 
     fill the seat vacated by Associate Justice Potter Stewart. On 
     September 21, 1981, the Senate confirmed O'Connor's 
     nomination by a unanimous vote, making her the first woman to 
     serve on the Supreme Court.
       (10) O'Connor established herself as a pragmatic, 
     independent voice on the Supreme Court, casting decisive 
     votes during a time when the Court was being asked to resolve 
     politically charged issues.
       (11) In the 1982 case of Mississippi University for Women 
     v. Hogan, O'Connor wrote the majority opinion holding that 
     the State could not prevent men from enrolling in an all-
     women's nursing school, writing that laws discriminating on 
     the basis of sex would be allowed only if there was an 
     ``exceedingly persuasive justification'' for them.
       (12) O'Connor sought, when possible, to find the middle 
     ground between her often-divided colleagues, frequently 
     joining the majority decision but presenting her views in 
     concurring opinions that eschewed broad

[[Page S9086]]

     constitutional doctrine in favor of resolving the cases 
     before the Court.
       (13) O'Connor put a very public face on the role of the 
     Supreme Court, domestically and around the world. She became 
     the Court's most prolific public speaker, traveling to all 50 
     States and to countless law schools, libraries, and public 
     events to describe how the Court works and its role in our 
     constitutional form of government. She traveled worldwide as 
     an ambassador for the Rule of Law and the independence of 
     judiciaries everywhere.
       (14) After 24 years on the Supreme Court, O'Connor 
     announced her retirement to care for her ailing husband, who 
     had Alzheimer's disease. President George W. Bush nominated 
     John Roberts, Jr., for the vacancy, but before Roberts was 
     confirmed, Chief Justice Rehnquist passed away, creating a 
     second vacancy. President Bush personally appealed to 
     O'Connor to remain on the Court so he could nominate Roberts 
     for the Chief Justice vacancy and have more time to make a 
     second nomination to the Court. In yet another act of public 
     service, O'Connor agreed to serve until Samuel Alito was 
     confirmed to fill her seat on January 31, 2006.
       (15) O'Connor began her retirement with 2 goals. One was to 
     convince more States to adopt merit selection of judges for 
     filling vacancies in State courts. The second was to educate 
     the public on the importance of an independent judiciary. Her 
     judicial independence work led to her awareness of a national 
     civics education deficit.
       (16) In 2009, O'Connor created iCivics.org to educate young 
     Americans about civics and what it means to be a citizen. 
     That endeavor grew to become the largest civics education 
     platform in the country, with over 7,000,000 students 
     annually enrolling in the programs. Its popularity was due to 
     a captivating online, interactive gaming approach. The 
     program was free to all and had no advertising. iCivics 
     played a crucial role in Educating for American Democracy, a 
     federally funded initiative to improve civics and history 
     education, which released its reports in March 2021.
       (b) Ruth Bader Ginsburg.--Congress finds the following:
       (1) Ruth Bader Ginsburg was born in 1933 in Brooklyn, New 
     York, and grew up in a low-income, working-class 
     neighborhood.
       (2) Ginsburg graduated from Cornell University in 1954, 
     finishing first in her class. Following her graduation, 
     Ginsburg enrolled at Harvard Law School in 1956, entering 
     into a class of 552 men and only 8 other women.
       (3) As a law student, Ginsburg became the first female 
     member of the Harvard Law Review, a prestigious legal 
     journal. She also cared for her husband, Martin Ginsburg, who 
     had been diagnosed with cancer, and their young daughter. 
     Ginsburg finished her legal education at Columbia Law School, 
     where she graduated first in her class in 1959.
       (4) Ginsburg taught at Rutgers University Law School from 
     1963 to 1972 and at Columbia Law School from 1972 to 1980, 
     where she became the school's first female tenured professor.
       (5) During the 1970s, Ginsburg served as the director of 
     the Women's Rights Project of the American Civil Liberties 
     Union. In this position, she led the fight against gender 
     discrimination and successfully argued 6 landmark cases 
     before the Supreme Court.
       (6) Ginsburg won 5 cases on gender discrimination before 
     the Supreme Court, including the case Weinberger v. 
     Wiesenfeld, which involved a portion of the Social Security 
     Act that favored women over men, because the Act granted 
     certain benefits to widows, but not widowers.
       (7) In 1980, President Jimmy Carter nominated Ginsburg to a 
     seat on the United States Court of Appeals for the District 
     of Columbia Circuit.
       (8) On June 22, 1993, President Bill Clinton nominated 
     Ginsburg to be an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, to 
     fill the seat vacated by Associate Justice Byron White. On 
     August 3, 1993, the Senate confirmed Ginsburg's nomination to 
     the Supreme Court by a 96 to 3 vote.
       (9) Ginsburg became the second female justice to serve on 
     the Supreme Court, as well as the first Jewish female justice 
     to serve on the Supreme Court.
       (10) As a justice, Ginsburg presented a strong voice in 
     favor of gender equality, voting rights, the rights of 
     workers, and the separation of church and state.
       (11) In 1996, Ginsburg wrote the Supreme Court's landmark 
     decision in United States v. Virginia, which held that the 
     State-supported Virginia Military Institute could not refuse 
     to admit women.
       (12) Ginsburg famously dissented in Ledbetter v. Goodyear 
     Tire & Rubber Co., where the plaintiff, a female worker being 
     paid significantly less than males with her same 
     qualifications, sued under title VII of the Civil Rights Act 
     of 1964 (42 U.S.C. 2000e et seq.), but was denied relief 
     under a statute of limitation issue. Ginsburg broke with 
     tradition and wrote a high colloquial version of her dissent 
     to read from the bench. In her dissent, she also called for 
     Congress to undo this interpretation of the law.
       (13) Ginsburg's impactful dissent in Ledbetter v. Goodyear 
     Tire & Rubber Co. led to the successful passage of the Lilly 
     Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-2; 123 Stat. 
     5), which was the first piece of legislation signed by 
     President Barack Obama.
       (14) Until the 2018 term, Ginsburg had not missed a day of 
     oral arguments, not even when she was undergoing chemotherapy 
     for pancreatic cancer, after surgery for colon cancer, or the 
     day after her husband passed away in 2010.
       (15) Ginsburg passed away on September 18, 2020.

     SEC. 2. STATUES HONORING JUSTICE SANDRA DAY O'CONNOR AND 
                   JUSTICE RUTH BADER GINSBURG.

       (a) Obtaining of Statues.--
       (1) In general.--Not later than 2 years after the date of 
     the enactment of this Act, in consultation with the Committee 
     on House Administration of the House of Representatives and 
     the Committee on Rules and Administration of the Senate, and 
     under such terms and conditions as the Joint Committee of 
     Congress on the Library considers appropriate, consistent 
     with applicable law, the Joint Committee shall--
       (A) enter into an agreement to obtain a statue honoring 
     Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States 
     Sandra Day O'Connor; and
       (B) enter into an agreement to obtain a statue honoring 
     Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States 
     Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
       (2) Consideration.--In selecting one or more artists to 
     make the statues obtained under paragraph (1), the Joint 
     Committee of Congress on the Library shall make the 
     announcement available to, and consider, artists from a 
     variety of backgrounds, including artists from 
     underrepresented demographic groups.
       (b) Installation.--
       (1) In general.--The Architect of the Capitol, under the 
     direction of the Joint Committee of Congress on the Library, 
     shall permanently install each statue obtained under 
     subsection (a) in a prominent location in the Capitol or on 
     the Capitol Grounds, as described in section 5102 of title 
     40, United States Code.
       (2) Priority for location.--In determining the location for 
     the permanent installation of each statue obtained under 
     subsection (a), the Joint Committee of Congress on the 
     Library shall give priority to identifying an appropriate 
     location near the Old Supreme Court Chamber of the United 
     States Capitol.
       (c) Funding.--Amounts available in the Capitol Preservation 
     Fund established under section 803 of the Arizona-Idaho 
     Conservation Act of 1988 (2 U.S.C. 2083) may be used by the 
     Joint Committee of Congress on the Library for payments for 
     the costs of creating and installing the statues obtained 
     under subsection (a), without regard to subsections (b) and 
     (d) of such section, provided that not more than $500,000 of 
     such amounts may be used for each statue obtained under 
     subsection (a).

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