Throughout her trailblazing legal career, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg attributed her career successes to motherhood. She succeeded because of motherhood, not in spite of it. She lived an extraordinary life, and her legacy will always include being a high-profile working mom.
In tribute to that legacy, President Trump’s shortlist to fill Ginsburg’s vacancy on the Supreme Court includes several working moms. As a young attorney hoping to start a family soon, I can’t help but be inspired and motivated by these hardworking women.
While any of Trump’s possible candidates would be a tremendous asset to the court, Judge Amy Coney Barrett of Indiana seems to be the front-runner. She was confirmed to the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in 2017 and has continued teaching at Notre Dame Law School while sitting on the 7th Circuit.
Barrett is an asset to the legal profession, and Trump should move quickly to nominate her to the Supreme Court. At this crucial time in our nation’s history, no Supreme Court seat should sit vacant for longer than is needed to nominate and confirm a new justice.
Trump’s nominee should understand that the role of a Supreme Court justice is to interpret the law and the Constitution fairly, not to play super-legislator by writing her own value judgments into law. While speaking at Hillsdale College in 2019, Barrett stated: “If we reduce the courts to mere politics, then why do we need them? We already have politicians.”
Barrett has proven that she values upholding the original understanding of the Constitution. It is certain she would bring the thoughtfulness that she has displayed as a professor and jurist to the high court.
In her time at Notre Dame Law School, Barrett has been recognized as Distinguished Professor of the Year three times. She’s also an alumnus of Notre Dame, where she graduated at the top of her class and earned the highest number of “best in class” awards in the school’s history.
Barrett has written frequently on precedent and stare decisis, the legal principle that courts rely on existing precedent. She has been critical, blaming an overreliance on stare decisis for creating inflexibility for the courts that makes it more difficult to overcome previous error.
A former clerk of Justice Antonin Scalia, Barrett cited him in Originalism and Stare Decisis, noting that her old boss was willing to overrule precedent outright in many cases, including in those on abortion, because stare decisis factors such as reliance and workability encouraged it.
One of my colleagues took a constitutional law course with Barrett, describing her as “tough but fair, someone who made you want to work harder in class” and “someone whose personal views did not shape the way she taught.”
Known for the strength of her Catholic convictions after the viral “dogma lives loudly” moment during her confirmation hearing for the 7th Circuit, Barrett walks the walk. She is an active mom of seven, including a child with Down syndrome and two adoptive children from Haiti.
The Barrett family is a beautiful witness that families come in all shapes and sizes. An anecdote in her hometown paper said that while the Senate was voting to confirm Barrett for her circuit court judgeship, she was back home in South Bend trick-or-treating with her children.
Could Ginsburg have imagined, when she was graduating law school top of her class without job offers because she was a woman and a mother, that someday the president would choose her successor for the Supreme Court from a group of qualified, talented working moms? Now, another working mother at the top of her law school class can carry on that legacy and continue to trailblaze for women in the legal profession.
Barrett has worn many hats: judge, professor, wife, mom. All have prepared her for another title: associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States.
Katie Glenn (@KatieGlenn) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. She is the government affairs counsel at Americans United for Life (@AUL).
