Question 1

True or false: RBG and her husband Marty were married for 56 years until his death.

Accepted Answer

True. They married in 1954 and Marty died in 2010, exactly 56 years. Their partnership was famously supportive, with Marty being her biggest champion.

Question 2

True or false: RBG was the first Jewish woman to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court.

Accepted Answer

True. Confirmed in 1993, she was indeed the first Jewish woman on the Court. The first Jewish justice was Louis Brandeis, but no Jewish woman served before her.

Question 3

True or false: RBG was appointed to the Supreme Court by President Bill Clinton.

Accepted Answer

True. Clinton nominated her in 1993 to replace Justice Byron White. She was confirmed 96-3, a remarkably bipartisan vote.

Question 4

True or false: Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote her first Supreme Court brief while in prison.

Accepted Answer

False. She wrote her first Supreme Court brief, for Reed v. Reed in 1971, while she was a law professor at Rutgers, not in prison.

Question 5

True or false: Ruth Bader Ginsburg was a talented opera singer who considered a professional career.

Accepted Answer

False. RBG loved opera and even appeared as a supernumerary in a Washington production, but she never seriously pursued it professionally. She was a lawyer through and through.

Question 6

True or false: Ruth Bader Ginsburg never publicly disagreed with fellow Justice Antonin Scalia.

Accepted Answer

False. Despite being close friends, they famously disagreed on many legal issues. Scalia wrote sharp dissents to her majority opinions, and vice versa. Their friendship was based on mutual respect, not agreement.

Question 7

True or false: Ruth Bader Ginsburg once dissented by reading her opinion aloud while wearing a lace collar.

Accepted Answer

True. RBG often read dissents from the bench, notably in cases like Shelby County v. Holder. Her lace collars became iconic—she had a 'dissenting collar' for such occasions.

Question 8

True or false: Ruth Bader Ginsburg lost more cases before the Supreme Court than she won.

Accepted Answer

False. As an attorney, she argued six cases before the Supreme Court, winning five and losing only one. Thus, she won more than she lost.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg Trivia Questions