Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg Dead At 87

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died Friday evening due to complications of metastatic pancreas cancer.

She was 87 years old.

“My most fervent wish is that I will not be replaced until a new president is installed,” Ginsburg said in a statement dictated to her granddaughter before her death, according to NPR.

US Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg poses during a group photo September 29, 2009 in the East Conference Room of the Supreme Court in Washington, DC. AFP PHOTO/Mandel NGAN (Photo credit should read MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images)

Ginsburg, the second woman to serve on the Supreme Court, was appointed by President Clinton in 1993.

She previously served on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, where she was appointed in 1980.

SWEARING-IN OF RUTH BADER GINSBURG (Photo by Jeffrey Markowitz/Sygma via Getty Images)

“Our Nation has lost a jurist of historic stature. We at the Supreme Court have lost a cherished colleague,” Chief Justice John Roberts said in a statement. “Today we mourn, but with confidence that future generations will remember Ruth Bader Ginsburg as we knew her — a tireless and resolute champion of justice.”

WASHINGTON, DC – APRIL 17: Supreme Court Justices Antonin Scalia (L) and Ruth Bader Ginsburg (R) wait for the beginning of the taping of “The Kalb Report” April 17, 2014 at the National Press Club in Washington, DC. The Kalb Report is a discussion of media ethics and responsibility at the National Press Club held each month. (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)

Before her career as a judge, she was best known for her work on gender equality. As a civil rights attorney, she argued pivotal gender equality cases before the Supreme Court. She also helped launched the ACLU’s Women’s Rights Project.

Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg reads to a group of children from a story book at the 10th Anniversary of TV’s “Reading Rainbow”. (Photo by © Wally McNamee/CORBIS/Corbis via Getty Images)

Gender equality was also a hallmark of her tenure as a Supreme Court justice. She wrote the majority opinion in a case that declared unconstitutional Virginia Military Institute’s all-male admission policy. Her scathing dissents in the gender discrimination case Ledbetter v. Goodyear, and  in the Hobby Lobby case, where the majority kneecapped Obamacare’s birth control coverage mandate, also earned her wide acclaim.

WASHINGTON, DC – OCTOBER 27: A surprise birthday party was held for Michael Kaiser, president of the Kennedy Center, on the stage of the Opera House. Supreme Court Justices Sandra Day O’Connor and Ruth Bader Ginsburg talk as their husbands look at the surroundings to right. (Photo by Susan Biddle/The Washington Post via Getty Images)

She penned notably sharp dissents in voting rights disputes as well, including the 2013 Shelby County case that gutted the Voting Rights Act and, most recently, an April dispute over absentee voting in Wisconsin’s primary during the pandemic.

RUTH BADER GINSBURG AT THE HEAD OF THE SUPREME COURT (Photo by Jeffrey Markowitz/Sygma via Getty Images)

Her passing gives Republicans the opportunity to cement conservative control of the Supreme Court for the next generation. Despite his 2016 stance that the vacancy left by the late Justice Antonin Scalia, who died in February before the election, would remain unfilled until the next President selected a nominee, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has made no secret that he intended to fill any vacancies created this year, even if it was just weeks before the election.

To block the Senate from confirming her replacement, Democrats will have to secure defections of at least four GOP senators.

The White House has already sent signals that it intends to name a nominee to fill Ginsburg’s seat, according to ABC News.

 

from Talking Points Memo https://ift.tt/2RHsEal