[applause] we will celebrate our dear friend with tributes that come from the heart composed and performed by Patrice Michaels and you can find it on the wonderful cd with all the lyrics to have a performance of it here last year it was set to music to touch all of our hearts and then i will have the extraordinary pleasure to talk with Justice Ginsburg of a series of what we are calling with conversations of our bg to collect our conversations over the years and i will ask her what she thought of the performance that the trees capture so beautifully in music and i cannot wait to hear her thoughts for the ladies and gentlemen please phenjoy the long view, a portrait of Justice Ginsburg in nine songs. [applause] may 2007. The individual statutorily entitled to sue for reparations for pay discrimination. June 2013 Shelby County versus holder. The constitutionality of provisions of 1965. June 2013, versus the university of texas with the affirmativeaction program constitutionally sound. June 2014 versus holly log Hobby Lobby Stores incorporated can privately held corporations deny birth inch one Birth Control to employees on the religious grounds . [applause] [applause] [applause] and it was so great to hear patrice is spectacular songs. I went to go through them with you because she took significant words from your life. And i want to hear more of your reflection about them. So we will start with the letter 1943 and knowing you could recommend for the appointment of my clerk. It is possible if i could find one that was absolutely first rate. Is that unusual is the attitude quick so tell me about the other women in that era on the Supreme Court. [inaudible] but there is not a superwoman and then to go up through 1968 and in the year 1943 we were at war. Many of the men were in service so he asked the question have you considered women . That the clerk is excellent. But there was not a single woman on the court for over 20 years. So in 1944 of through 1968 and then there was a special case because margarets father was a very well known democratic politician. It didnt work out so well. The justice told his clerk i want you to go over for review and she said this weekend my father has to appear at fundraisers and my mother died and the justice didnt take very kindly to margaret not completing those for review. But then in 1972, to say the narrative of the four clerks both women and that was his reaction to that that they are here with a vengeance. [laughter] and it wasnt until the seventies that women began to show up in numbers in the court. And that is typical for the way things were. Now we come to this remarkable piece and patrice said it so powerfully, and imagined letter august 12, 1949, and the advice that your mother gives you in this letter is advice that you often repeat. You told it to me for our conversations. And i asked you how you were actually able to follow the advice that says and its so important to get the exact word words, she says first to be independent, prepare for difficulty, stand on your own 2 feet like Eleanor Roosevelt. What is the context . My mother said dont lose time on useless emotions like anger. Envy. Those suck time and will not get you anyplace. So one way i had to cope i would sit down and practice the piano. I wasnt very good at it. [laughter] but it did distract me for whatever useless emotion i was feeling at theow moment and then i did the same with the cello. So i think i was absorbed in the music and the useless emotion gave away. I have to tell you when we talked about bad advice come i said this is the advice of great wisdom traditions it so hard to achieve in practice. He said yes, how do you actually do it you said if i dont do it i lose precious time from productive work. But i find myself every day when im going to lose my temper of anger or jealousy i think what led Justice Ginsburg do . [laughter] honestly and now practice us every day, and i trying to restrain myself. We know famously you go to the gym to work out. How do you practice serenity in your mind . Do you meditate . No. [laughter] but i do follow advice my motherinlaws advice on the day i was wed. We were married in my motherinlaws home. She took me aside just before the ceremony to tell me the secret of a happy marriage. It was it helps sometimes to be a little deaf. [laughter] which is advice i have followed assiduously in every workplace even in my current job. [laughter] [applause] i practice that advice as well. [laughter] but i have to ask you more because it is a life lesson everyone around the country who is heard you describe it they want to know how to practice it. So let me ask you more about the context your mother was talkin talking, you just lost your sister only six and gone and your mother told you always to move on and dont be tapped by grief and always focus on doing your work and on you path. I dont have a memory of my sister because i was not yet two when she died. That she was a presence in my growing up. You can imagine a tremendous tragedy to have a sixyearold child die of meningitis this was before penicillin and then to see a child suffer and die there wasnt even a suffering drug. That stays at the parent forever. You also lost your mother when you were in high school of course. How did her advice given to you in high school to be like Eleanor Roosevelt carry you forward as you face those challenges for which she could not have prepared you . Did you continue to learn those lessons . With the advice be independent it would be very nice if you met prince charming and live happily ever after. But it may not turn out that way. But it did. [laughter] but she said always be prepared to be left standing and independent. And this was at a time when most wives were considered dependent if a man his wife affected adversely the man there was lying about be nice tot jane. She was ruggedly invited for play dates on the weekends as a classmate. There was an enormous change from the birth of my daughter from the birth of my son ten years later in the fifties. He was born 1955 there are very few workingng moms. Ten years later, my son is born. It is not at all unusual to have a two breadwinner family. It was a sea change in the way people were living in that ten year span. Some of that change took place after you went to law school and cared for jane and the third song the advice is so powerful if you really want to go to law school then stop feeling sorry for yourself i will surmount this and way to do what i want to do your astonishing selfdiscipline id focus and determination is aweinspiring and did he help you cultivate that quick. I was overjoyed but on the other hand worried how i could cope with the first year of law school and follow his advice was if you dont want to go to law School Nobody will think less of you. If you really do want to become a lawyer then you will stop feeling sorry for yourself and find a way. And that advice is important in my life and i had to ask do i really want this . And if i do a find a way. The first thing i did was to ask everyone i knew wherever i wa was, do they know a nanny in the boston area. [laughter] and as luck would have it there was a young couple in the process of divorcing and they had a wonderful nanny. So law school was fine the. [laughter] before we leave this. You were so selfpossessed early on he wrote the letter to Eleanor Roosevelt which made me weep about the need to resurrect them and the rvg exhibit going around the country there are editorials from the cornell newspaper about wiretapping and surveillance. Did you feel these life lessons were instilled by your mother or important ones that came after that . The f y important in being productive. To be able to concentrate [inaudible] it is childrens hour we sing silly songs and then but i had to make the most of the time it was helping [inaudible] to stay up all night he had a between nine and 1 00 [inaudible] went to sleep about 2 00 and i would begin my own work. It is a resolution to you every moment. [inaudible] people would stay out all day and take time to read the newspaper. I think it worked out well for me. The next one is working together and itsth the story that is now immortalized in the wonderful movie. Its great that you are doing the song cycle. [applause] he said he wanted the script to be as much the story as the story of theen development strategy. There is a factual question i have to ask her room was bigger than. It was lined with tap this. Because that story was so well told you want to ask how focused you are on the details of their lives and how you kept in touch with them and learn from them and have grown with them and you are going to see cher in this summer for the anniversary of the amendment. Tell me and our friends what did you learn from her when f you first met her [inaudible] to the members of the service she was told those benefits were not for women. She has access to medical and dental facilities. She couldnt believe that. I should get the same pay. In truth its an equal pay case. But the equal pay act is not applied. [inaudible] [laughter] [applause] got a note from her today. She is now a grandmother. To be able to speak of the case as part of a federation on the 100th anniversary of the 19th amendment. What is she doing now . Shes living in the union, and shes retired that is keeping very busy taking care of her grandchildren. [inaudible] married to a woman who is a teacher in high school, had a very healthy pregnancy, she went to the hospital to give birth and the doctor came out and told steven you have a healthy baby boy, that your wife died. He wasnt work fulltime [inaudible] be able to support himself and his child. These benefits are not available to you. These are mothers benefits. In the early 70s steven contacted the editor of a local newspaper and the letter started out ive heard so much talk about [inaudible] what he told you what happened to me, and he described going to the office [inaudible] you have to work fulltime to support both of them and does Gloria Steinem know about this . A woman teaching in the Spanish Department read the letter and she called me and said this isnt right. Getting in trouble with the local affiliates of the aclu is how the case began. We are in touch [inaudible] it was wonderful because the court divided the union and was divided three ways. If hes discriminated against because his wife is the wage earner and Social Security [inaudible] but doesnt get the same protection. Discrimination against the male as a parent. Why should a woman only have the opportunity to care for a child. And there was one who said why should this baby have the opportunity for parental care when one parent is deceased hurt women, men and children. It iso extraordinary hearing you talk about these cases. Theyve kept in touch with the people involved and displayed such an incredible sympathy and concern. What is happening if these were not stage cases, we are not goingg out looking for plainti plaintiffs. People with alert and generalized on the basis of gender. School teachers that were forced out of the classroom and as one School Superintendent put it [inaudible] [laughter] in the 70s they stopped accepting as part of the territory. And they said this isnt right we shouldnt be forced out of the classroom we are capable of working. So that was one series of cases in the 70s. That was is pregnancy discrimination discrimination on the basis of sex. The first status was no because the world will divide it into law and the pregnant people nonpregnant people and then women ar that are pregnant, so n its six discrimination. There was the coalition all across the political a spectrum agreed to discrimination act was passed at the end of the 70s. Is it discrimination on the basis of sex. Similar things were happening in the university world. Is it possible for 500. In the early 70s, women started coming to law school in numbers and there were women there in numbers. Other women were encouraged if there are so many women doing it, we can too. So now they were at least 50 of the class. This is a hard question because it is hard to know the sources of ones own character but the empathy that you have represented and for the law clerks and your family and friends is one of the striking features about you. Where did that and he and concern for others come from . If they have begun by how my parents were affected by the death of my sister. So what it was like two if i had to point to any thing. You can feel other peoples pain. Its to the real challenges. Your alert to the challenges that the people represent face. Yes. If it can make someone feel a little better. Or at least to feel that they are not alone. It is a trying situation and then made it through. I know it certainly helped me to in my cancer bouts to have the support and advice of another empathetic person and opposed Sandra Day Oconnor who have had a mastectomy and was on the bench nine days after her surgery. So when i had cancer, she gave me some very good advice about how to handle it including scheduled chemotherapy on a friday that way you would get over it and be back in court on monday or she said now i know that you like to acknowledge and there will be hundreds of people writing to you. Dont try to answer any of them. I responded just put it aside. Dot ability to focus on the concern of others in the middle of your own challenges you showed me last year my mom just passed and you handed me the note and i quoted in the book and that was so thoughtful of you. Thank you for taking the time to know remora error i or in your n tragedy. It was until the last moment to, but tonight im feeling fine. [applause] weve got to go back to the show because there are some important other question. If i could Say Something about anita, she is another one that i stay in touch with. She was supposed when he delivered the briefs and then you showed up and she was impressed by how elegant you were i suppose. Was she writes to imagine and say i am not a wife, i am a person. Tell us that story. She was a fantastic typist and has been a flamenco dancer. What happened to her and what did she do afterwards . What did she do after and were thehourthey still in touch . What was next was at the elevators on . You have told the story before, but we now know this is happening at the school in 1975. I was there of course because i was a year behind and we now know that the headmaster who called you and called marty about the elevator was donald barr who was the father of the current attorney general. [laughter] i didnt know that. [laughter] he had a son now running the justice department. Tell us more about what donald was like because he was a very controversial neoconservative character who wanted teachers with kazaa. He had a program to introduce children to science. I thought that was innovative and was a fine program. James, my son is what i called lively and his teachers called hyperactive. [laughter] he was kind of the class clown. He took the elevator on a dare from his classmates. The operator had gone out for a smoke so james took the elevator upstairs and was met by three stone faces when he got there. I stayed up all night writing a brief and i got calls from the school. I was weary and i said this child has two parents, please alternate the phone calls. It is his fathers term. He stole the elevator, how far could he take it. I think it was the reluctance to take a father away from his work there was no change in his behavior. But the calls came barely once a semester because the reluctance to take a father away from his work. Would it not be treating women different as parents . Dot they hesitate to call another. To her life was lessons are so precious what did you impose, with discipline that you impose on james . Something about james, he loved music from when he was very small he wouldnt sit still for anything else. I knew i could always get to that way. Sadly, no talent as a performer. Today she makes the most exquisite. That is one of the recordings. Its a chicago Recording Foundation and im really proud of what hes accomplished. In a partnership with patrice and her glorious music. Can you get your son to stop flying his model airplanes during class and i was surprised that he was doing that. To believe that he will teach this class and that got him to focus. And he did. And he was very frustrated. It always comes back. No question about it. [laughter] the dissent of the universe. I wantne to ask you love music o much and relate to it in such a powerful intimate way, and you told me that it takes you outside of yourself and when you listen to music, you cant think about the briefs and the writings you have t to do to fos totally on the music. I want to ask what is this likee and how did you feel your great design sense to music, did it strike you as a natural or did it amplify if . It was a wonderful, wonderful piece. This whole notorious rbg was started by a second year student who followed my mothers advice. She started it when the case took out the Voting Rights act and she was angry and decided anger wasnt a productive emotion, so she was going to do something positive. She took not the lengthy dissent, but the bench announcement that i read that normally they are not spread from the bench. The author of the majority opinion was a dissent that not only did they get it wrong but egregiously so and then you want to call attention to the dissent by summarizing it from the bench. So thats what i did in the Shelby County case. And she put that out and it took off. It certainly did. It was interesting she decided notorious rbg after we all know the wrapper the curiou notorious b. I. G. We were both born and bred in brooklyn new york. [applause] [laughter] and i think it took off because people were yearning for some story, something that is positive and in my life i have seen so many changes for the good. Most important is that we are now using the power of all of the people and not just half. And that is largely thanks to you. I was fortunate to be around at the right time. Society wasnt readye. To listen people were living a lot longer so i think that a woman would spend most of her life with no child care responsibilities. If you wanted your family to prosper and then taking care of them wathe most easier than it s before. Many things were working in favor of the change. I was there able to take part of this. Think of the socalled war on court said its okay to keep women off the jurys because they are the center of home and family life. One of them is to participate in the administration of justice. Men have no automatic exemption that the women are expendable. That persisted into the 60s. In the 70s, there was a different reality still. The cases were decided when morgan was the chief justice and the part that had the label. I would say in the 70s i was speaking to an audience in a Larger Society and certainly the churches. The understanding [inaudible] women were excused from jury duty because who would want to serve if they didnt have to. Saying women couldnt be bartenders because cars were pretty raunchy places. The biggest challenge i have is to get the judges to see far from upgrading the favor as Justice Brennan said to put women not on a pedestal, but on a cage. The magnitude of the achievements of the Womens Movement as president clinton was able to say when he nominated you were not appreciated even by some womens groups and theyve made people appreciate those in the workplace, the mobilization of young women who look to you as a hero, how do you account for the fact that society now recognizes the magnitude of the importance of the work you did in gender equality today in a way that it did even 20 years ago . The president who nominated me. [laughter] the change for the 20th area this has happened more recently in the past ten or 15 years, and your biographers will have to account for this but with the social changes do you think are important in sensitizing america to the crucial importance of the gender equal with the . It leads one to be optimistic about the future. Ive often said whats the difference between a book keeper and the district and Supreme Court justice one generation my own life bears witness, the opportunities open to my mother who was a brilliant woman and oppose open to me. So it is an exhilarating change and it is a permanent change when they were not seen in the decisionmaking. Your optimism is so inspiring and when we talked last july for the last interview and the book, i asked you whether you are optimistic or pessimistic about the future of thehe supreme cout are you still skeptically helpful to yes. We were fighting a war against racism and our troops going into that rigidly separated this is a time when many people say things havent been worse for a long time why are you optimistic and why do you believe that we were emerged from these times with those values intact backs because we have in the past. And we will again. The reason im optimistic they are determined to together, so they make me hopeful. Think of the [inaudible] and what will you say to them, but most young people do . To preserve the values of the justice and freedom and democracy . One thing they have to work. Ogether many of them have talked to people about the importance of getting out the vote. To be sure to register to vote. You were not a great fan of learned hand who unwisely turned you down for a clerkship because the were a woman that he did Say Something meaningful. He said something to the effect is when liberty is lost, no court can restore. Do you believe that . Yes. That was a great speech. Liberty lives in the hearts and minds of many women. They are not there to filter change. They are following a movement that is in the Larger Society. That was true with respect to Racial Justice and its true now with the Womens Movement and its true see if i can get the visuals right. How long that discrimination lingered when people were hiding is only when they came out and said we are proud of it. And once they did, the changes occurred rapidly. Its one oits led toit led to t the need for a quality in the workplace and the courts do play a role. I need to ask about a point that came out in the buck you said in one of the interviews you hoped the courts would not enforce the nondisclosure agreement in the cases. Because his agreements suppress of this happening they are often armed with agreements. What is your response . To that kind of an agreement . We will pay you if you will be quiet . You remain optimistic about me to and about the need for justice. Do i think of me to movement is here to stay, yes. The New York Times knew about Harvey Weinstein and has told about two years before the story broke i feel like lincoln. I am loathed to close. Every meeting with you is wonderful so im going to ask you whether there is a dream you have that you have yet to fulfill, something you would still like to do, what is a dream you would like to fulfill, but his next you would like . I have my dream job as i have said. Its the hardest and best job ive ever had. I love what i do and as long as i am able to do it. Fullstop and, i will. [applause] [applause] at a recent event held at the American Enterprise institute in washington, d. C. , National Review editor rich lowry offered his thoughts on nationalism. Here is a portion of the program. The way that i think about this, it was occasion i hadnt d thought about nationalism i just shared the assumption until the inaugural address that got me thinking about it a little more deeply. Under the influence of a business elites that is more transnational and Samuel Huntington a social scientist talked about how i a 19th centuh century the Business Innovations and changes that created there was a local affiliation i of the late 20th and 21st century with the same kind of technological innovation and Business Trade that was more of an attitude and then finally george w. Bush overly idealistic emphasis on his foreign policy. Implicitly, instinctively,o deen trump. Before the election of donald trump. The eu think that its nationalism and the nationstate those forces have to be faced to be imperial project. The version of those and britain when faced with the question showed some significant part of your sovereignty be run out of brussels or westminster and that is a nationalistic answer and shows how its a broad phenomenon given that trump is obviously driving the debate. If hes driving the debate does that mean that the case for nationalism has to bear the burden . Some of the things that are what you want to suggest or not nationalist if you get trump on the teleprompter and listen to some of the things he said. The best speech of the presidency and advanced the idea and it has been overrun by foreign occupying armies and partitioned over the years and subjected to the unspeakable horrors. It hasnt gone away because they are so polish and that is the essence. It might be between rousseau and trump and the suppress was occupied by russia stick to your traditions and culture. It is a deeply moving truth. Once he gets off the teleprompter and is in the wild. Its something about the effect. Its above partisanship and to say that its a unifying potential is an understatement. You can come up with many examples. Just two months ago when he was briefly at war with the city of baltimore, he said that no human being would want to live in west baltimore and human beings do and they are americans and donald trump is the head of state of the United States of america and just to often that doesnt seem to make any impression by him. Congratulations on the ree