June 15, 1994 - Ruth Bader Ginsburg Named to Supreme Court by President Bill Clinton

"My mother told me to be a lady. And for her, that meant be your own person, be independent."

"We live in an age in which the fundamental principles to which we subscribe -- liberty, equality and justice for all -- are encountering extraordinary challenges, ... But it is also an age in which we can join hands with others who hold to those principles and face similar challenges.”

"Women will only have true equality when men share with them the responsibility of bringing up the next generation."

It is not women's liberation, it is women's and men's liberation."  

"Every constitution written since the end of World War II includes a provision that men and women are citizens of equal stature. Ours does not."

Today, we celebrate the life and work of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the second woman ever to serve as a U.S. Supreme Court Justice. A long-time women's rights advocate, Justice Ginsburg suggests to us that to be a "lady" is to be an independent thinker and an activist committed to equality. This contrasts sharply with the traditional definition of lady as a genteel (and generally subdued) woman of a respected social position, yet is a more apt definition for the twenty-first century, suggesting that the true measure of "class" is the degree to which a woman follows her own internal compass rather than conforming to society's norms.