University of California Hastings College of the Law, the first law school of the American West, was honored to welcome U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on September 15, 2011. Justice Ginsburg was interviewed by Professor Joan C. Williams before a fully packed auditorium of legal students, alumni, faculty, and practitioners and others as part of Legally Speaking, a series of probing interviews with prominent lawyers, judges, and academics, co-produced by UC Hastings and California Lawyer.
Professor Williams began the conversation by thanking Justice Ginsburg for her presence, and alluded to an incident the day before in which Justice Ginsburg was forced to evacuate her flight to San Francisco.
"Not everybody is willing to jump out of a plane onto an inflatable slide," joked Professor Williams.
"I had not planned that as part of my journey here," replied Justice Ginsburg.
The interview touched on a broad range of subjects, from opera to marriage to work/life balance, doctrinal questions, gay rights, the death sentence, and cases from the 1970's to present, including the court's role in establishing individual rights and equal protection.
"You can have all the rights in the world," said Justice Ginsburg, "but if you can't enforce them, they don't mean very much."
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