NARRATOR: We all know Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
Feminist icon, renowned planker,
and the second female justice to ever sit on the Supreme Court.
But that's just scratching the surface of why she's notorious.
Ruth is beloved by many for breaking barriers
and trying to make the world a little more just.
And she did that by being meticulous in her thinking
and deliberate with her words.
That, and perhaps her sly way of throwing shade
led her to use what she wore to reflect her values.
You know what we're talking about: the collar.
The idea started simply enough.
The Supreme Court justices' robes were designed
with a notch in the collar
to reveal the neck tie worn by the man underneath.
Until the court's uniform caught up with the times,
Ruth and fellow Justice Sandra Day O'Connor decided
to make their own fashion statement
with elegant white collars.
Over the course of Ruth's time on the court,
she accumulated about 40 collars.
Many were gifts,
and her collection became colorful and elaborate
with shells, lace, beads, and embroidery.
But her earlier collars were simple and white.
Back in 1993, when she was confirmed as a justice,
Ruth was considered a moderate who would not create controversy.
Ruth's mother, Celia, often told her, "Be a lady,"
but she didn't mean little Ruth had
to stop playing dodge ball or do better in Home Ec class.
She wanted Ruth to understand the importance of being civil
and not letting her emotions get in her way.
It was advice Ruth took to heart
even when she got her law degree
and she was turned down repeatedly for jobs
and was paid less simply because she was a woman.
But in the 1970s, Ruth became a revolutionary.
At the time, a woman couldn't get a credit card
or be protected against sexual harassment at work.
And women had had enough.
There were marches, sit-ins,
and demonstrations taking place all over the country.
Ruth did her part, not by protesting,
but by taking on legal cases about tax deductions,
military housing benefits, and the legal drinking age.
Ruth believed that lasting change
happens slowly and methodically.
Over the course of her career, case by case,
Ruth fought like a lady
and chipped away at systemic discrimination.
And one of the ways she did that was by fighting
on behalf of men who defied gender roles.
Ruth believed that women would never truly be equal
until the men took on half of parenting
and household responsibilities.
Her husband Marty was her partner in every way,
often putting her career before his own
and cooking more than his fair share of family dinners.
Ruth and Marty didn't follow norms,
and she wanted everyone to have that option.
She took on Steven Wiesenfeld's case to make that point.
Steven's wife, Paula, had died giving birth to their son.
She had been the breadwinner
and they had planned on her working
and Steven staying home to raise their child.
Steven was determined to stick to the plan,
but there was a problem.
Under the Social Security Act,
only widowed women were entitled to financial help in raising a child.
Ruth went to court and argued for Steven
for stay-at-home dads,
for working mothers, and for children,
and won a unanimous decision.
The case was part of her master plan to change norms
and legal precedent
by proving gender-based discrimination hurt men too.
Ruth figured the all-male Supreme Court
would sympathize more
with a man facing discrimination than a woman.
And years later, when she couldn't get her fellow justices
to see her point of view,
how could we not talk about this collar?
It's the dissent collar,
her signal that she was not happy about a decision made by the court.
Even as a justice, Ruth was always looking to make her case
so she wrote thoughtful dissents,
like when a 2013 decision struck down voter protections
that had been proven to curb racial discrimination.
She wrote that getting rid of something that worked
was like throwing away your umbrella in a rainstorm
because you are not getting wet.
One of Ruth's most important dissents
as a Supreme Court justice led to real change.
In 2006, the Supreme Court heard a case about Lilly Ledbetter,
a woman who worked for Goodyear for almost 20 years
and was paid $15,000 a year less than her male colleagues
in the same role.
She initially won her case,
but it was overturned on appeal
and eventually made its way to the Supreme Court.
They ruled against Lilly,
saying she had filed her charge too late
and Goodyear couldn't be held responsible
for discrimination that had happened years before.
But Lilly had only learned about the discrimination
shortly before her retirement through an anonymous note.
It wasn't fair, and Ruth said as much
when she read her dissent from the bench,
which was not normal practice.
In it, she slammed the majority for not understanding
how common gender discrimination in pay is
and how hard it is to uncover.
She threw down the gauntlet by saying,
"Once again, the ball is in Congress's court.
"The legislature may act
to correct this court's parsimonious reading of Title VII."
And they did.
In 2007, several members of Congress introduced legislation
that would change the law so the next Lilly can get justice.
In January 2009,
Congress passed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act,
and it was the first piece of legislation President Obama signed into law.
Though women today still only make about 80 cents
for every dollar a man makes
and even less for women of color,
Ruth Bader Ginsburg worked tirelessly
to ensure she left us all a better world
than the one she lived in.
A world where women can control their finances,
their body, and their destiny,
and where men are not limited to being breadwinners.
A world where we all can live our lives as we dreamed.