18 to 0 vote. The full Senate con-
firmed her appointment on August
3, 1993, by a vote of 96 to 3. Ginsburg
became the 107th justice, the second
woman to sit on the Court (joining
Sandra Day O’Connor), and the first
Jewish justice since Abe Fortas’s de-
parture in 1969.
Through the October, 1999,
term of the Court, Ginsburg au-
thored 146 opinions: sixty-one ma-
jority opinions, forty concurring
opinions, thirty-eight dissenting
opinions, and seven opinions in
part concurring and in part dissent-
ing. More than one-third of her
opinions for the Court were unani-
mous. A liberal associate justice, she
most often agreed with Justices John
Paul Stevens, David Souter, and
Stephen G. Breyer. She most often
disagreed with Chief Justice William
H. Rehnquist and Justices Antonin
Scalia and Clarence Thomas.
The subject matter on which Gins-
burg has written the most opinions is
civil procedure, a topic she taught while a law school
professor during the 1960’s and 1970’s. She has ex-
hibited a strong opposition to state-sanctioned reli-
gious exercises, and she has consistently voted to
uphold affirmative action programs and minority-
majority districts. She authored the majority opinion
inChandler v. Miller(1997), in which the Court struck
down Georgia’s 1990 law requiring candidates for
public office to submit to drug testing to certify that
they were drug-free.
Ginsburg has continued to interpret the equal
protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to
prohibit artificial barriers to equal opportunity.
Most notably, she authored the majority opinion in
United States v. Virginia(1996), in which the Court
struck down Virginia’s exclusion of capable women
from educational opportunities at the Virginia Mili-
tary Institute.
Impact Ginsburg’s contribution to women’s rights
in the United States was secure long before she
joined the Supreme Court in 1993. As a justice, she
emerged as among the most liberal members of the
Court.
Further Reading
Glenn, Richard A. “Ruth Bader Ginsburg.” InGreat
American Lawyers, edited by John R. Vile. Santa
Barbara, Calif.: ABC-Clio, 2001.
Perry, Barbara A.“The Supremes”: Essays on the Current
Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States. New
York: Peter Lang, 2001.
Richard A. GlennSee also Clinton, Bill; Jewish Americans; Supreme
Court decisions; Thomas, Clarence; Women’s rights. Giuliani, Rudolph
Identification Mayor of New York City, 1994-2001
Born May 28, 1944; Brooklyn, New York
Giuliani reduced citywide crime and corruption, brought
conservative values to New York City, and was mayor dur-
ing the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
Rudolph Giuliani graduated magna cum laude from
New York University Law School in 1968. He began
his career as assistant U.S. attorney prosecutingThe Nineties in America Giuliani, Rudolph 371
Ruth Bader Ginsburg accepts her nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court in 1993.
(NARA)