Lamont on Ruth Bader Ginsburg: ‘Remember her legacy every day’
Late Supreme Court justice’s memory honored at city gathering
On a cool, September day with the occasional gust of blustering wind, Gov. Ned Lamont asked a crowd of people to recall what Ruth Bader Ginsburg once said about female representation on the nation’s highest court.
“Remember when they asked her how many female justices is enough on the Supreme Court?” he asked. “Remember what she answered?”
“Nine,” a group of people called back from the more than 100 people gathered outside the State of Connecticut’s Superior Court in Stamford.
“So, you remember that, you remember that, you remember that,” he said,
pointing to members of the crowd, “and we’re going to stand up and remember her legacy every day. It only works if you remember what she stood for, remember what she meant to all of us, and live it in our lives.”
Lamont was one of several speakers, including Lt. Gov. Susan Bysiewicz and U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, who spoke to people who came out to honor the late justice’s memory Sunday afternoon. The event was organized by a coalition of local activist groups, said Brook Manewal, co-founder of Pink Wave in Connecticut.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg, 87, died in her home from complications of metastatic pancreas cancer Friday night. That night, U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell also announced in a statement that a nominee for the now-vacant spot on the nation’s highest court would be put to a vote on the Senate floor.
Appointed to the court in 1993, Ginsburg spent close to three decades deciding the fates of key legal issues alongside her fellow
justices. But her work as a lawyer before that — which included successfully arguing several noteworthy gender-discrimination cases to the Supreme Court — was already distinguished.
Stamford resident Sherry Tarantino a member of Suburban Women Against Trump, came out to the memorial “to honor RBG.”
“She was a fantastic woman who has really struggled to achieve what she achieved during her lifetime, especially being a woman,” she said. “And I’m not sure any of us women would be where we are today without her diligence.”
With it being “so chaotic right now, politically,” Tarantino said she wanted to make sure civil rights didn’t get “squashed during this time.”
“I don’t want to go backwards,” she said.
With about a month and a half left until the November election, Ginsburg’s death comes at a key time in American politics. The vacancy leaves Democrats pushing to have her spot filled after the election and Republicans hoping to push through a Trump-appointed nominee for a judge who will likely serve for several years to come.
Jere Eaton, of Stamford, said Ginsburg’s willingness to go against the grain and her famous dissents stood out to her.
“I think a lot more people have got to start dissenting,” she said. “Because we’ve been going along with the status quo for so long that I think that’s the reason why we’re seeing a lot of what’s going on between Black Lives Matter, through what’s happening at the deportation areas for people who are not citizens here, and then also for women’s rights. And if
we don’t act more like Ruth Ginsburg, we could end up back to where we were in the ‘50s.”
Bianca Shinn, a Stamford resident, is on the board of directors for the local League of Women Voters. She came out, wearing a pink shirt that said “Women Can Do Anything” because she said “we have to fight, stay mobilized, feet on the ground, show up and vote.”
“Especially for communities of color, every election, we’re fighting for our rights on every ballot,” she said. “In this election, it’s like we were fighting in the ‘50s.”
Rosalea Fisher, a retired educator who lives near the courthouse, also noted the significance of the coming election.
Ginsburg was her “hero,” Fisher said. She came wearing Ruth Bader Ginsburg socks showing the former justice lifting weights and wearing a sweatshirt that said “Super Diva.” She also had a mask that displayed Ginsburg’s face among Marvel superheroes.
“I have followed her career — everything I’ve read about her I already knew,” Fisher said. “I think she’s done an amazing job over the years for women and for everyone. And we needed her. I didn’t want her to die before the
election.”
When Blumenthal delivered the closing remarks of the event, he recounted a story about how he argued three cases before her at the U.S. Supreme Court when he was the state’s attorney general. His biggest fear, he said, was that she would ask him questions.
“And she did,” he said. “She asked me, in one of the most incisive, insightful questions — she asked me a question that actually rescued me from another question that Justice Scalia had asked me, by getting me out of a rabbit hole and back to the point, and that’s my point. She always knew what was important. She always knew what was important in rights and liberties and human values.”
He said he would fight to uphold that legacy. That includes “her dying wish,” he said — that a nominee not be confirmed to the court before the election.
“As a member of the United States Senate Judiciary Committee, I can pledge to you I’m going to fight like hell,” he said, the crowd drowning out his words with whoops and applause. “We are going to take our case to the American people.”