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Part 4Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Part 4: “A Judge Becomes a Justice”
Part 4, Introduction Summary
In their introduction to this section, the biographers note that Ginsburg was not the first choice to replace retiring Justice Byron White. Ginsburg comments, “I was the last one left standing” (167). The process, as they describe it, was fraught with concern because several previous confirmation hearings had been rancorous and divisive. They relate the details of Ginsburg’s election, including missteps such as Ginsburg’s wearing casual clothes to meet with President Clinton, who appeared dressed in a suit. Promised that she would get a call from President Clinton at the end of a basketball game he was watching, Ginsburg waited for three hours and 20 minutes when the game went into triple overtime. Then, the White House phone connection created a problem when Ginsburg and President Clinton could not hear one another. Finally, he was able to speak to her and assure her that he wanted her to be his nominee for the Supreme Court.
Part 4, Chapter 1 Summary: “Rose Garden Acceptance Speech”
Ginsburg’s biographers describe her introduction in the White House Rose Garden on June 14, 1993. President Clinton emphasized that Ginsburg was a moderate rather than a liberal or conservative. When Ginsburg approached the podium, Clinton bent the microphones down so that she could speak into them.
After thanking Senator Moynihan, who sponsored her, Ginsburg introduced her family. She spoke about the scarcity of female jurists at the highest levels and expressed her aspirations as a justice. She expressed her thanks to various people who helped her attain her position as a federal judge and then expressed her gratitude to her mother, Celia Amster Bader.
Ginsburg’s Rose Garden speech provoked tears and appreciation. President Clinton wept as he said to Ginsburg, “That was a terrific job” (178).
Part 4, Chapter 2 Summary: “Senate Confirmation Hearing Opening Statement”
The beginning of Ginsberg’s confirmation hearings before the Senate on July 20, 1993, sparked numerous comments about the convivial, relaxed atmosphere. Her biographers write:
Even the most conservative senators remarked that, although they might differ with Judge Ginsburg on particular issues, they respected her intelligence and ability and thought she was well qualified to be a Supreme Court Justice (180).
In her opening statement before the committee, Ginsburg described her background, noting that she came from a working-class Jewish family in Brooklyn, and her parents were too poor to attend college but instilled in her high principles.
Ginsburg then pointed out that the US Constitution is the oldest written constitution remaining in force in the world. She explained, “Serving on this Court is the highest honor, the most awesome trust that can be placed in a judge” (184). Ginsburg cautioned the senators that she would not discuss any specific issue or case, as that would serve as an injustice to any case she might potentially hear. She referred to the thousands of documents she had made available to the senators and asked that they evaluate her on that written record.
The result of her hearing was a perfect 18-0 vote of acceptance from the committee. The full Senate approved her nomination by a vote of 96-3.
Part 4 Analysis
Collegiality is the hallmark of Part 4. Ginsburg’s biographers note that her mother cautioned her as a child to “be a lady,” (5) eschewing uncivil behavior. Her mother-in-law counseled her to be deaf to unkind words, letting them pass without retaliation. In commenting on her letter to the Cornell newspaper, her biographers say, “[I]n classic Ruth Ginsburg fashion, the letter displayed none of the shrillness, bombast, or ideological fervor that can sometimes characterize the writing of college students and even some judges” (22). For a person accustomed to shaking up the legal and legislative worlds, Ginsburg was a calm, collected individual.
As the text conveys, such a person was exactly what the country’s leaders wanted in the summer of 1993. The biographers note that the Bork and Thomas hearings were extremely contentious, something that no one in the process wanted to experience again. Searching for a palatable choice for the next justice, President Clinton reached out in collegial fashion to ask Justice Scalia whom he could live with as the new junior justice. Ignoring the choices President Clinton gave him, Justice Scalia spoke Ginsburg’s name.
In this case, collegiality, a quality Ginsburg repeatedly emphasizes throughout, paved the way for her nomination and confirmation. The relationship in question already existed between Ginsburg and Scalia, who had served together as judges on the DC Court of Appeals. Although universally perceived as mismatched in every respect, Ginsburg and Scalia shared a collegiality that paved her way to the court. Likewise, the collegiality she swiftly developed with O’Connor smoothed her way on the court. Collegiality, Ginsburg maintains, is the necessary key to effective jurisprudence.
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