NELP Mourns the Passing of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg 

Following is a statement from Rebecca Dixon, executive director of the National Employment Law Project: 

The National Employment Law Project (NELP) joins all who mourn the passing of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, a trailblazer for women in the legal field and a historic figure in the fight for women’s rights and equality. Justice Ginsburg did not serve passively – she set legal frameworks to uphold and protect justice across the most pressing issues of our time. As the longest-serving Supreme Court justice, her opinions, decisions and dissents championed gender and LGBTQ equality, healthcare, racial justice and workers’ rights – supporting people-led movements on the just side of history.   

We honor her humanity and her perseverance as a woman to break ground in a male-dominated field. As the first Jewish woman on the Supreme Court, she once said, “I am a judge, born, raised and proud of being a Jew. The demand for justice, for peace and for enlightenment runs through the entirety of Jewish history and Jewish tradition.” Her commitment to justice was greatly informed by the Holocaust: “It makes you more empathetic to other people who are not insiders, who are outsiders.” 

Earlier this year, Justice Ginsburg expressed that she would like the next justice to be a Native American woman. Given the lack of Native representation and understanding of American Indian law in the context of the United States as a colonial settler state, this representation could have a great, needed impact for first nations. Before she passed, Justice Ginsburg also made her wish clear that a nomination should happen after the 2021 inauguration; it is our hope at NELP that both her wishes be honored, and for the sake of justice, we join those who will fight to make it so.  

We will honor Justice Ginsburg’s great contributions, learn from her legacy of a lifetime of public service, and be inspired to work with people-led movements to make this a more just world. 

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