Held each year on Justice Ginsburg’s birth anniversary, March 15, the National Judicial College’s RBG Lecture honors her impact on the law and our society, and we learn more about her from people who were close to her. This would have been her 89th birthday. 

This year’s lecturer will be Hon. Goodwin Liu, an associate justice of the California Supreme Court who clerked for her during the Supreme Court’s October 2000 term. The title of his lecture is: “Reflections on RBG: Life, Legacy and Lessons.”

The son of Taiwanese immigrants, Justice Liu grew up in Sacramento, where he attended public schools. He went to Stanford University and earned a bachelor’s degree in biology in 1991 and graduated from Yale Law School in 1998.

Nominated by Governor Jerry Brown, Justice Liu was unanimously confirmed to the Supreme Court by the Commission on Judicial Appointments and sworn into office in 2011. He was retained by the electorate in 2014.

Before joining the state’s highest court, he was a professor of law and associate dean at the UC Berkeley School of Law. He continues to teach constitutional law as a visiting professor at Harvard Law School.

He has served on many boards, committees and commissions, including the governing boards of the American Constitution Society, the National Women’s Law Center and the Public Welfare Foundation. He is considered an expert and an advocate for diversity in the legal profession. When Justice Liu was nominated to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, members of the Women’s Law Center sent more than 13,000 emails in support of his appointment.

About the Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg Lecture

Justice Ginsburg spent much of her legal career as a champion of gender equality and women’s rights. She won many arguments before the Supreme Court and served as an associate justice from 1993 until her death in September 2020.

An anonymous donor provided seed funding for the lecture series and for dedicated scholarships to our Judicial Academy course for lawyers who aspire to become judges.

What: Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg Lecture (virtual)
When: Tuesday, March 15 (RBG’s birth anniversary), at 11 a.m. Pacific, 2 p.m. Eastern
Where: online — Register for link: https://bit.ly/3Je8wpo