"The Masks Are Off"

Just four weeks ago members of the Senate gathered just down the hallway in Statuary Hall.  We gathered to honor Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the first woman to lie in state at the U.S. Capitol.  Justice Ginsburg was a trailblazer, a woman who may have stood at just over five feet tall but was nonetheless a giant of the law.  The nation grieved for her, not simply because she was a brilliant lawyer and justice, but because she was a fighter.  And she fought for those who needed fighting for most — Americans for whom the promise of America was still just a promise. 

I have spoken at length about what Justice Ginsburg meant to the struggle for equality for millions of Americans.  I will not repeat those words today, except to say that Justice Ginsburg’s life’s work left our nation a more perfect union.  We will forever be in her debt.