Vigil for Ginsberg held in Fort Bragg
FORT BRAGG » A group of nearly 50 people, mostly women, gathered Saturday evening in front of Town Hall to mourn the loss of Supreme Court Justice, Ruth Bader Ginsberg.
Ginsberg, who died Friday at her home in Washington D.C. from complications of metastatic pancreatic cancer, was 87. She had served as an associate justice since 1993, and was only the second woman appointed to the court. After the retirement of Sandra Day O’Connor in 2006, Ginsberg served as the only female justice on the bench until the appointment of Sonia Sotomayor in 2009 and Elena Kagan in 2010.
“It’s just such a loss,” said Ruby Sherpa, who attended the vigil in Fort Bragg. “I’ve been having such an emotional day and last night, reading tributes to her.”
Ginsberg is often hailed as a feminist hero, having been instrumental in the moderate-liberal decisions surrounding numerous cases of gender equality, worker’s rights and the separation of church and state.
“It’s such a huge loss for all of us,” Sherpa said, and added she was “worried” about losing certain women’s rights with a court that could now veer sharply to the right.
“In my younger days, I had some abortions and one was illegal,” she said. ‘ I’m worried our rights will be chipped away without (Ginsberg) on the Supreme Court .”
For others, the vigil was less political and more mournful. Mary Rose Kaczorow ski put the call out on social media after news broke of Ginsberg’s passing as a way to honor the associate justice and her life’s work.
“This memorial is about attesting to the life of a giant. It’s about protecting the constitution and the rights of women and LGBT and other represented people,” Kaczorowski said. “(Ginsberg) worked for the people, not a political party.”
Val Muchowski, chair of the Mendocino Women’ s Political Coalition, called the former associate justice “an inspiration to us all.”
“I am devastated, it’s going to be some terrible times. I think the next two months are going to be hell,” Muchowski said.
The group stood in a cir-cle outside Fort Bragg’s Town Hall for approximately 30 minutes and some sang songs. Kaczorowski then asked the group to observe nine minutes of silence. She said she was disheartened to see “strong comments” online immediately following the announcement of Ginsberg’s passing and that the vigil was not “a Trump thing.”
“Not everything is about Trump,” she said. “This is about a woman who, through all odds and obstacles, kept her integrity and honesty and made it to the Supreme Court and saved our country.”
(Editor’s note: Kaczorowski has worked as a freelance writer for both the Advocate-News and The Beacon in the past.)