2020年经济学人 美国最高法院大法官鲁斯·巴德·金斯伯格(2)（在线收听）

And she especially attacked the striking down, in 2013, of Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act in Shelby County v Holder, on the supposition that racism had waned enough to discard it. That, she wrote, was “like throwing away your umbrella in a rainstorm because you are not getting wet.” Being contrary, she needed to be extra sharp. She took pride in the speed with which she wrote opinions, and in their clarity. Twice a week she lifted weights, did push-ups and generally honed herself into a lean, Armani-clad contender.

鲁斯特别抨击了2013年谢尔比县诉霍尔德案中推翻投票权法案第五部分的行为，她认为种族主义已经减弱到足以抛弃它。她写道，这“就像在暴风雨中，因为你没有淋湿而扔掉雨伞。”相反，她需要格外敏锐。她为自己写意见的速度和条理清晰而自豪。鲁斯每周举重两次，做俯卧撑，把自己锻炼成一个瘦削的、穿着阿玛尼服装的竞争者。

In oral argument she liked to leap in first, keen to establish at the start whether the plaintiff had really been damaged, or not. (Her shy, soft, pause-filled delivery off the bench really speeded up then, to Brooklyn fast.) She often announced her dissents orally, from the bench, to show how much she disagreed, and in the trying 5 to 4 years when she regularly led the dissenters she made sure they spoke with one voice. On those days she wore her “dissenting collar”, a grey, stony, quietly menacing number. It fitted the occasion nicely.

在口头辩论中，她喜欢抢先一步，急于在一开始就确定原告是否真的受到了损害。(她在法官席上腼腆、温柔、停顿的讲话速度真的加快了，快到了布鲁克林。)她经常在法官席上口头宣布她的不同意见，以表明她有多不同意，在难熬的四五年时间中，当她定期领导异议者时，她确保他们用一个声音说话。在那些日子里，她戴着“异议领”，那是一件灰色的、石质的、有威胁性的领子。它很适合那个场合。

Yet she did not see herself as disruptive, let alone an activist. If she became more of a dissenter with the years, it was because the court, after 2006, swung over to the activist right. At heart she was still what she had always been, a judicial minimalist. She was stunned by the lack of caution in the Roe v Waderuling of 1973 that legalised abortion; though she certainly approved of the outcome, reform should have come through state legislatures, where it was slowly starting to appear. She was shocked too when the court, while upholding Obamacare, found it illegal under the commerce clause of the constitution; that had been Congress’s domain since the 1930s.

然而，鲁斯并不认为自己是破坏性的，更不用说是一名激进分子。如果随着时间的推移，她变得更加持不同意见，那是因为2006年之后，最高法院转向了激进的右派。在内心深处，鲁斯仍然是她一直以来的样子，一个极简主义者。1973年罗伊诉瓦德鲁林案使堕胎合法化，鲁斯对该案缺乏谨慎感到震惊；尽管她肯定赞同这一结果，但改革应该通过州立法机构进行，在那里，改革已经开始慢慢显现。还使他感到震惊的一件事是，法院支持奥巴马医改，根据宪法的商业条款，这是非法的；自上世纪30年代以来，这一直是国会的地盘。