Women of the Supreme Court

Women of the Supreme Court

Men and Women Are Equal For Ruth Bader Ginsburg, 1971 was an important year. She was a lawyer for a case going to the U. S. Supreme Court. The Supreme Court protects our rights by deciding whether laws follow the guidelines created by the U. S. Constitution. In Ginsburg's case, the Court would decide if women were equal to men under the law. This important case was called Reed v. Reed.

At that time, few women were let into law schools. Because Ginsburg had a young daughter, she had lost a chance to be a law clerk on the Supreme Court. At a new job, her pay was reduced because she was pregnant. Yet men did not lose jobs or pay if they had children. Ginsburg believed that women and men should be treated equally in school, at work, and under the law.

In Reed v. Reed, Ginsburg and others talked about the Fourteenth Amendment. That amendment was added to the Constitution after the U. S. Civil War to protect the rights of people who had been enslaved. At that time, few people cared about the rights of women. Ginsburg argued in Reed v. Reed that the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution also protected women from discrimination. Since an Idaho law favored men over women, she argued that the state law was illegal.

The Supreme Court agreed with Ginsburg. For the first time, they decided that the Fourteenth Amendment did, indeed, protect women's rights. After this decision, other laws that discriminated against women were also fought and also changed. No longer could women be denied education and jobs because they were women.

A Cowgirl for Justice Since the start of the Supreme Court in 1790, its justices had always been men. Ten years after Reed v. Reed, Sandra Day O'Connor became the Court's first female justice. Sandra grew up on a ranch in Arizona. She rode horses and was treated like one of the boys. After going to law school, though, she found that no one would hire a female lawyer. So O'Connor opened her own law office.