RBG’s passing leaves Texas women determined to carry on fight
Democratic activist Rufi Natarajan was celebrating her birthday at home with a few close friends Friday evening when she learned that Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the revered feminist icon known as “RBG,” had died at age 87 — less than two months before the presidential election.
“It was supposed to be a celebration, but it very quickly turned into something else,” Natarajan, of Houston, said Saturday morning. “I am absolutely, totally devastated and heartbroken.”
Millions of Americans shared that sense of grief over the passing of Ginsburg, who devoted her career to fighting for gender equality and gained a huge following with her strongly written dissents on an increasingly conservative high court. That this 5-foot-tall, 100-pound grandmother continued to be such a force while beating cancer twice before, working out with a trainer regularly and maintaining a wry, charming demeanor made her a hero to many, and women in particular.
“I have not shed tears for anyone since my mother passed until now,” said state Rep. Sarah Davis, the only openly prochoice Republican legislator in Texas, on Twitter.
Democrats lamented that Senate Republicans were moving swiftly to try and fill the seat of Ginsburg, who had dictated a note before her passing that said, “My fervent wish is that I will not be replaced until a new president is installed.”
“Republicans didn’t even waste time,” said Jen Ramos, the president of Austin Young Democrats, on Saturday, adding that she was still reeling from the news. “They didn’t even let us sit and mourn.”
Still, President Donald Trump acknowledged that Ginsburg — recently the focus of a hit 2018 documentary “RBG” and a feature film about her early career, “On the Basis of Sex” — “was an amazing woman who led an amazing life.”
Born in Brooklyn in 1933, she
became one of the only women in her class at Harvard Law School; she eventually graduated at the top of her class (a tie) from Columbia Law School after moving to New York. She then taught law at Rutgers Law School and Columbia Law in addition to leading the ACLU in key fights as director of its Women’s Rights Project.
Lobbying by her eversupportive husband, Martin Ginsburg, also an attorney, brought her to the attention of President Bill Clinton, who was reportedly won over during a 90-minute private meeting. She was confirmed by a 96-3 vote in August 1993, during a more civil era of Supreme Court confirmation hearings that Ginsburg herself had voiced hope that the Senate might return to someday.
As a Supreme Court justice, Ginsburg established herself as a fearless, steadfast and dignified voice for women’s rights, LGBTQ rights, and civil and voting rights.
While it was known that Ginsburg was being treated again for pancreatic cancer — she had survived colon cancer in 1999 and early-stage pancreatic cancer a decade after that — her passing still felt like a gut punch during a year marked by nearly 200,000 COVID-19 deaths, changes to daily living, the killing of George Floyd, protests in the streets and the passing of civil rights leader John Lewis.
In a year that has brought hardship to so many Americans, and left so many voters on both sides of the aisle worrying about the stability of our institutions and the viability of our democratic experiment, it was cruel timing to lose Ginsburg during the final weeks of an unsettling presidential campaign.
“It was shocking and painful,” said Dyana Limon-Mercado, the executive director of Planned Parenthood Texas Votes. “There’s already so much anxiety and fear happening about reproductive rights.”
Ginsburg’s record as a trailblazer, she continued, has been vivified in recent years by documentaries and movies depicting how often Ginsburg was literally the only woman in a room filled with men, as well as a lone voice for equal rights.
“It’s hard to imagine the isolation, and also the courage that it took to really stand out in those days,” Limon-Mercado reflected.
Limon-Mercado recalled that in the Supreme
Court’s 2016 ruling striking down House Bill 2, a measure passed by the Texas legislature in 2013 that required facilities providing abortions to meet hospital-like standards, Ginsburg wrote her own opinion in addition to concurring with one by Justice Stephen Breyer for the Court’s 5-3 majority.
“It is beyond rational belief that H. B. 2 could genuinely protect the health of women, and certain that the law would simply make it more difficult for them to obtain abortions,” Ginsburg wrote, demonstrating the forthrightness that helped endear her to a younger generation of activists and inspire future jurists.
“She always had purpose — with everything she said, with everything she did,” said Judge Amy Clark Meachum, a Democrat who is currently running to be the first woman to lead the Texas Supreme Court. “There were no moments wasted. There were no words wasted in her opinions. They were often succinct, biting, and illuminating all at the same time.”
Ginsburg’s voice would be missed on the Supreme Court regardless, but all the more so given that Trump, who has a track record of misogynistic statements and actions, will nominate her successor. “We have this obligation, without delay!” he tweeted.
His allies in the GOPcontrolled Senate have already begun maneuvering. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who notoriously refused to hold confirmation hearings on President Barack Obama’s nomination of Judge Merrick Garland to the high court in 2016 because it was an election year, is trying to argue that the circumstances are different this time around.
“President Trump’s nominee will receive a vote on the floor of the United States Senate,” he said in a statement Friday evening.
Texas’s two senators, John Cornyn and Ted
Cruz, were quick to indicate their support for this plan, even though both waxed eloquently in 2016 about the importance of not approving a Supreme Court nominee in an election year.
How this will play out for the GOP remains to be seen. A new survey from Marquette Law School, completed three days before Ginsburg’s death, found that 48 percent of respondents considered the next Supreme Court pick to be a “very important” consideration in their vote this year. That figure will likely increase in the wake of Friday’s news — and on Saturday morning, some of the Texas women left reeling were getting to work.
“I know many people feel hopeless and helpless,” Limon-Mercado said of Ginsburg’s passing. “But she left us a legacy and we have to carry it forward.”
Said Ramos: “We don’t have the luxury to have political apathy anymore.”