Rutgers university residence hall to be named for Ruth Bader Ginsburg

Former US Supreme Court justice taught at New Jersey-based law school for five years before taking position at Columbia and founding the Women’s Rights Project

By Shira Hanau 23 December 2020, 8:36 am

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Ruth Bader Ginsburg, celebrating her 20th anniversary as a Supreme Court justice, is photographed in a conference room at the high court in Washington, August 30, 2013. (Nikki Kahn/The Washington Post via Getty Images)

JTA — Rutgers University will name a residence hall after the late US Supreme Court justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Ginsburg, who died in September at 87 from complications of metastatic pancreatic cancer, taught classes at the Rutgers law school from 1963 to 1972 on women’s rights and gender equality. She went on to argue major cases on gender discrimination before the Supreme Court, eventually becoming a feminist icon and earning the moniker “notorious R.B.G.”

The residence hall is a former law school building and still houses some 100 law students, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer.

“When I think of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, I hope future generations will understand her perseverance, her clear-eyed pursuit of justice and equity, and her care for those people who are often seen as voiceless or without history,” Rutgers President Jonathan Holloway said, according to the Inquirer.

After graduating from Columbia Law School and clerking for a federal judge, Ginsburg taught at the Rutgers law school for five years before going on to teach at Columbia and founding the Women’s Rights Project at the American Civil Liberties Union. She was appointed to the US Court of Appeals in 1980 and to the Supreme Court in 1993 by president Bill Clinton.