Boston Bar Association Statement on the Passing of Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg

The Boston Bar Association expresses its deep and profound sadness at the loss of Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

As a lawyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg was a tireless advocate for women’s rights; indeed, she was the architect of the legal strategy that made equal rights of women before the law as more than merely an aspiration.

As an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, Justice Ginsburg used her penetrating intelligence to protect the most vulnerable among us: employees facing workplace discrimination; criminal defendants challenging unfair law enforcement tactics; women challenging laws unconstitutionally impairing their right to control their own bodies; and Black women and men seeking to exercise the right to vote they fought so hard to obtain.

Justice Ginsburg’s loss leaves a deep tear in the fabric of justice. That it comes so soon after the death of our own Chief Justice Ralph Gants, makes the blow all the more cruel.

The best way—the only way—for the BBA to honor the legacy of Justice Ginsburg, so similar to the legacy of Justice Gants, is to redouble its commitment to the vision that animated her life and work—the passionate pursuit of equal justice before law. We pledge to do so.

RIP, RBG.