Ruth Bader Ginsburg quotes

Ruth Bader Ginsburg was an influential American Supreme Court Justice and a pioneering advocate for gender equality. Her landmark legal work helped transform civil rights laws and inspired generations. She became a cultural icon for her dedication to justice and the advancement of equal rights. Here are 59 of her quotes:

Fight for the things that you care about, but do it in a way that will lead others to join you.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

Throwing out preclearance when it has worked and is continuing to work to stop discriminatory changes is like throwing away your umbrella in a rainstorm because you are not getting wet.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

Neither federal nor state government acts compatibly with equal protection when a law or official policy denies to women, simply because they are women, full citizenship stature - equal opportunity to aspire, achieve, participate in and contribute to society based on their individual talents and capacities.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

It's a facet of the gay rights movement that people don't think about enough. Why suddenly marriage equality? Because it wasn't until 1981 that the court struck down Louisiana's 'head and master rule,' that the husband was head and master of the house.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

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

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

Dissents speak to a future age.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

People who have been hardworking, tax paying, those people ought to be given an opportunity to be on a track that leads towards citizenship, and if that happened, then they wouldn't be prey to the employers who say, 'We want you because we know that you work for a salary we could not lawfully pay anyone else.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

In sum, the Court's conclusion that a constitutionally adequate recount is impractical is a prophecy the Court's own judgment will not allow to be tested. Such an untested prophecy should not decide the Presidency of the United States. I dissent.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

Frankly I had thought that at the time Roe was decided, there was concern about population growth and particularly growth in populations that we don't want to have too many of.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

Undocumented aliens unfortunately are not protected by the law and they are tremendously subjected to exploitation. The result is that they would be willing to work for a wage that no person who is welcome in our shores would, would take. I think the answer to that problem is in Congress' lap. People who have been hardworking, tax paying, those people ought to be given an opportunity to be on a track that leads towards citizenship and if that happened, then they wouldn't be prey to the employers who say "we want you because we know that you work for a salary we could not lawfully pay anyone else."

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

The state controlling a woman would mean denying her full autonomy and full equality.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

All respect for the office of the presidency aside, I assumed that the obvious and unadulterated decline of freedom and constitutional sovereignty, not to mention the efforts to curb the power of judicial review, spoke for itself.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

Nine, nine... There have been nine men there for a long, long time, right? So why not nine women?

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

[L]egal challenges to undue restrictions on abortion procedures do not seek to vindicate some generalized notion of privacy; rather, they center on a woman's autonomy to determine her life's course, and thus to enjoy equal citizenship stature.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

It is essential to woman's equality with man that she be the decisionmaker, that her choice be controlling. If you impose restraints that impede her choice, you are disadvantaging her because of her sex.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

Abortion prohibition by the State, however, controls women and denies them full autonomy and full equality with men. That was the idea I tried to express in the lecture to which you referred.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

The decision whether or not to bear a child is central to a woman's life, to her well-being and dignity. It is a decision she must make for herself. When Government controls that decision for her, she is being treated as less than a fully adult human responsible for her own choices.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

Dissents speak to a future age. It's not simply to say, "My colleagues are wrong and I would do it this way."

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

I think the notion that we have all the democracy that money can buy strays so far from what our democracy is supposed to be.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

If you want to influence people, you want them to accept your suggestions, you don't say, 'You don't know how to use the English language,' or 'How could you make that argument?' It will be welcomed much more if you have a gentle touch than if you are aggressive.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

I would not look to the U.S. Constitution if I were drafting a constitution in 2012.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

There's nothing in the Constitution that says the President stops being President in his last year.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg