This extensively documented account, incorporating more than 100 pages of chapter notes and a bibliography that cites hundreds of resources, is also quite engaging and very easy to read. Expect plenty of interest.
... exhaustive ... This version is designed for the historical record — though it’s history from Ginsburg’s perspective, and no less partisan than 'SNL.' Written with the justice’s cooperation, it is in many ways like its subject: scrupulously researched, largely humorless, and so intent on collegiality that it seems to name-check every single person involved in the 1970s women’s movement.
And Ginsburg’s role in the law-related aspects of that transformation will be familiar, at least in general terms, to anyone drawn to this weighty book (546 pages of text and 111 pages of endnotes, to say nothing of the bibliography and index) ... De Hart’s lengthy narrative, strong on facts, is less so on analysis. (And her grip on Supreme Court procedure is shaky: The court, for example, does not have a 'spring term.') We are left to wonder what it was, beyond obvious dismay at the court’s conservative turn, that transformed a judge known for singing the virtues of minimalism and consensus-building into a famous dissenter...
This hefty book of more than seven hundred pages portrays the history of an outstanding legal expert known and applauded for her advancement of gender equality and civil rights. It is an American story that should be read as an example of what is possible when one has family support, internal grit, moral certainty, and scholarly expertise. Read about Ginsburg’s role in the ACLU, look into case histories, watch her as a college professor, look at the political wrangling, and examine her performance as a judge in the Appeals Courts and as a Supreme Court Justice. This is a wondrous tale, recorded well, that resounds as an American epic.
Does a daunting job of restoring Ginsburg’s impressive roots ... As Martin Luther King Jr. said, 'The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.' De Hart leaves no doubt that, in Justice Ginsburg’s hands, that arc will undoubtedly continue to bend.
In a revealing new biography, 15 years in the making, Jane Sherron De Hart helps untangle the mystery of the decorous Ginsburg as feminist gladiator ... De Hart well understands that this project is itself sexist—feminist litigator as kindergarten teacher, gently persuading, carefully encouraging male empathy—and that Ginsburg succeeded by being the very opposite of a firebrand. De Hart also appreciates that Ginsburg’s approach was almost her undoing in the generation that followed ... De Hart details the ways in which Ginsburg has emerged in recent years as a newly vocal critic of the conservative majority’s systematic dismantling of voting rights, workers’ rights, and reproductive rights ... [De Hart's portrait of Ginberg is] ample...
Ruth Bader Ginsburg: A Life marks the first full-length biography of the justice ... RBG resisted sharing extensive reflections on her life with De Hart, and the book does not contain her candid thoughts on the future of the Supreme Court and the Constitution. Nevertheless, De Hart has written an excellent biography based on archives and interviews with colleagues and friends: In its comprehensiveness, range and attention to detail, this is a vivid account of a remarkable life ... De Hart’s chapters on the landmark cases Ginsburg argued, which were the original core of her book project, are detailed and accessible.
The public's familiarity with Ginsburg's life presents a challenge for a serious biographer, but Jane Sherron de Hart... has succeeded with a masterful biography that adds depth and insight to Ginsburg's only-in-America life story ... With limited information about the Court's internal operations, De Hart's account of Ginsburg's tenure necessarily relies primarily on her written opinions ... Ginsburg's persona recedes somewhat in De Hart's thorough descriptions of that and other major cases during Ginsburg's tenure.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg: A Life... offers a detailed account of Ginsburg’s childhood in Brooklyn, her close relationship with her mother, who died of cancer when Ruth was just beginning college at Cornell University, and the difficulties faced by a brilliant young woman in the halls of academe in the 1950s ... De Hart’s thorough biography relates this life story with a nice sense of the sweep of feminist and legal history that is contained within it ... For all this, there is less of a sense of [Ginsburg's] own thoughts and feelings than one could hope for. Personal expressions of the deep and animating factors that have guided her life are missing. Beyond her legal writings and opinions, the inner Ruth remains elusive.
... scholarly, yet accessible ... Occasionally, however, Ms. De Hart devotes pages to important issues before the court where Justice Ginsburg’s vote was her most visible contribution, a questionable allocation in a biography ... Ms. De Hart’s extensive sources include few interviews or communications with other justices, judges or law clerks, sources that would have provided a fuller picture of Justice Ginsburg’s work on the bench. Such sources are difficult to obtain. Even without them, Ms. De Hart has produced a rewarding and compelling biography of an inspiring person and pioneer whose work has made America a more just and better nation.
... [an] engaging and admiring biography ... Naturally, a good deal of Ms. De Hart’s narrative concerns Justice Ginsburg’s jurisprudence, with the author dissecting Supreme Court cases as wins and losses from her subject’s point of view. Those who champion Justice Ginsburg’s nontextualist approach to decision making—emphasizing broad statutory purposes and policy consequences over literal text and consistent tradition—will find the explanations satisfying; others may find them somewhat tendentious.
That De Hart is an historian comes through ... The book is lengthy, and mainly for the serious student, but it is readable and rewarding for those interested in learning about Justice Ginsburg's groundbreaking career and remarkable life.
Couldn't have come at a more opportune time ... This in-depth tome clocks in at more than 500 pages, but promises a first-of-its kind look inside RBG's personal and professional lives ... already at the top of our holiday shopping lists for the formidable women and girls in our lives.
De Hart’s narrative is most revealing when she analyzes Ginsburg’s work as a brilliant legal strategist whose advocacy career began in earnest in 1972 when she helped found the Women’s Rights Project at the ACLU ... De Hart displays an impressive grasp of each area of Ginsburg’s legal influence, from women’s rights to voting rights to gay rights to immigrant rights, with a particular focus on striking down laws that discriminated on the basis of gender ... De Hart’s fidelity to detail in these matters may frustrate those hoping for more about Ginsburg’s private life ... Statements from friends and colleagues are largely encomiums. However sincere, there’s a certain deadening quality to praise heaped on praise ... A complete portrait of her inner struggles, and the outcome of her very public ones, will have to wait for a future biography.
The first comprehensive biography of Ruth Bader Ginsburg ... De Hart excels in explaining the majority opinions, and later the dissents, in which [Ginsburg] participated with remarkable clarity, illuminating the issues, the competing positions, and the significance of each in language easily grasped by readers with no legal training (for a nonlawyer, De Hart has a remarkable grasp of court jurisprudence) ... A monumental biography of one of the most influential and revered Supreme Court justices of the last century.
A laudatory biography ... pays appropriate attention both to the experiences that informed Ginsburg’s passion for justice and to her personal life ... De Hart’s great strength is her ability to explain Ginsburg’s cases and the legal strategies she employed ... clearly and accessibly lays out background information, the various legal theories employed, and the judges’ holdings ... Readers will find this an insightful, fascinating, and admiring biography of one of America’s most extraordinary jurists.
