Few voices in American history echo as powerfully as Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s (1933-2020). Whether she was fighting for gender equality, serving on the Supreme Court, or inspiring the next generation with her razor-sharp dissents, RBG always knew how to drop a quote that made you pause. From feminist fire to legal legend, Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s words still hit hard. In this roundup, we’re serving her most iconic quotes on justice, leadership, women’s rights, and yes, a few savage one-liners too.
My mother told me to be a lady. And for her, that meant be your own person, be independent.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
So that's the dissenter's hope: that they are writing not for today but for tomorrow.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
A gender line… helps to keep women not on a pedestal, but in a cage.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
You can't have it all, all at once. Who - man or woman - has it all, all at once? Over my lifespan, I think I have had it all. But in different periods of time, things were rough. And if you have a caring life partner, you help the other person when that person needs it.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
The emphasis must be not on the right to abortion but on the right to privacy and reproductive control.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
When a thoughtless or unkind word is spoken, best tune out.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Fight for the things that you care about, but do it in a way that will lead others to join you.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
All respect for the office of the presidency aside, I assumed that the obvious and unadulterated decline of freedom and constitutional sovereignty, not to mention the efforts to curb the power of judicial review, spoke for itself.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
I can't imagine what this place would be. I can't imagine what the country would be. With Donald Trump as our president.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
I think daughters can change the perception of their fathers.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
The court generally moves in small steps rather than in one giant step.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
I think a law clerk told me about this tumblr and also explained to me what Notorious RBG was a parody on.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Anybody who has been discriminated against, who comes from a group that's been discriminated against, knows what it's like.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
At my advanced age – I'm now an octogenarian – I'm constantly amazed by the number of people who want to take my picture.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
When I was growing up, there were no women in orchestras. Auditioners thought they could tell the difference between a woman playing and a man. Some intelligent person devised a simple solution. Drop a curtain between the auditioners and the people trying out. And, lo and behold, women began to get jobs in symphony orchestras.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
I certainly respect the belief of the Hobby Lobby owners. On the other hand, they have no constitutional right to foist that belief on the hundreds and hundreds of women who work for them who don't share that belief.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
We still have many neighborhoods that are racially identified. We still have many schools that even though the days of state-enforced segregation are gone, segregation because of geographical boundaries remains.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
We have the oldest written constitution still in force in the world, and it starts out with three words, 'We, the people.'
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
I try to teach through my opinions, through my speeches, how wrong it is to judge people on the basis of what they look like, color of their skin, whether they're men or women.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
It is not like I have gone crazy, I just don't want to take any chances. You never know what could happen.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
I think unconscious bias is one of the hardest things to get at.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Undocumented aliens unfortunately are not protected by the law, and they are tremendously subjected to exploitation. The result is that they would be willing to work for a wage that no person who is welcome in our shores would take.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Most states in the union where the death penalty is theoretically on the books don't have executions.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
When I graduated from law school in 1959, there wasn't a single woman on any federal bench. It wouldn't be a realistic ambition for a woman to want to become a federal judge. It wasn't realistic until Jimmy Carter became our president.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Who will take responsibility for raising the next generation?
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
There's nothing in the Constitution that says the President stops being President in his last year.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
We've come a long way from the days when there was state-enforced segregation. But we still have a way to go.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Collegiality is crucial to the success of our mission. We could not do the job the Constitution assigns to us if we didn't - to use one of Justice Antonin Scalia's favorite expressions - 'Get over it!'
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
I think the notion that we have all the democracy that money can buy strays so far from what our democracy is supposed to be.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
You can't have it all all at once. Over my lifespan, I think I have had it all, but in given periods in time, things were rough. And if you have a caring life partner, you help the other person when that person needs it.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
If there was one decision I would overrule, it would be 'Citizens United.' I think the notion that we have all the democracy that money can buy strays so far from what our democracy is supposed to be.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
