The XX Factor: What women really think.

Ledbetter and Ginsburg and a Cheer for the Feisty Gals

EJ, one other thing about Ledbetter: Obama’s signing of the act came just days before the announcement that Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. While Ginsburg appears to be recovering nicely from her surgery, the announcement last week brought a rash of speculation about who might replace her. I am not prepared to even think along those lines, but I am prepared to speculate that without Ginsburg’s lifelong commitment to women’s equality and her passionate (and very personal) dissent in the Ledbetter case, the issue of pay parity would not have blossomed into the national Ledbetter tsunami that helped sweep Obama into office in November. Ginsburg is not a diva, but when she read the majority opinion in Ledbetter, she went as close as she goes to ballistic; begging the court for just a sliver of reality-based thinking. She gave those of us who know that pay discrimination rarely comes with an embossed card explaining that you’re being screwed, a charge to fix the court’s mistake. I believe that as Ginsburg has gotten older and gone from being one of two women on the court to the only woman on the court, she’s come to understand that sometimes making a little noise is the most ladylike thing to do. The passage of the Ledbetter Fair Pay Act is ultimately a tribute to her as much as anyone.