"I ask no favour for my sex. All I ask of our brethren is that they take their feet off our necks."
This quote was first said by Sarah Grimke in 1837 but was repeated by Ginsburg in the supreme court. She states that she is asking for no special favors for women, but is instead just asking for the bare minimum of fair treatment. In this sense, she reframes her argument to disarm her critics, stating that she is not demanding favors for women, but is instead asking that they will not be hindered unnecessarily by the law. This idea underlies many of her court cases and arguments; for example, in Ruth's first Supreme Court Case, called Frontiero v Richardson, she fought for a woman in the air force to simply be treated the same as the men but didn't make any special demands for her.
"I also have somewhat of a scholarly relationship with her. She taught me that the way to win an argument is not to yell because often that will turn people away more so than bringing them to your table."
Ginsburg's granddaughter followed in her grandmother's footsteps and graduated from law school herself. She describes her relationship with her grandmother as having a "scholarly" element to it, as there is obviously a lot to learn from Ginsburg. One lesson she learned from Ginsburg is that the best way to win an argument is to keep calm and to avoid being angry or confrontational. This is something Ginsburg practiced herself during her legal career, as she is known for her soft-spoken manner.
"I was terribly, terribly nervous, but then I looked up at the justices and saw I had a captive audience. I knew that I was speaking to men who didn't think there was any such thing as gender-based discrimination, and my job was to tell them it really exists."
When describing her first Supreme Court case, Ginsburg says that she was very nervous. Nonetheless, she realized that she had a duty to persuade the court with her arguments, and try to prove the existence of gender-based discrimination. Her argument is described as having "sheer force," and her audience was captivated throughout her speech, due to the novel nature of the subject.
