SOME MEMORIES OF A LONG LIFE SIGNED BY RUTH BADER GINSBURG (1st Edition)

Rediscovered by Ruth Bader Ginsburg, this unique account of life before, during, and after the Civil War was written by the wife of Supreme Court Justice John Marshall Harlan, who played a central role in some of the most significant civil rights decisions of his era. A chronicle of the times, as seen by a brave woman of the era. Ruth Bader Ginsburg, from the foreword.

When Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg began researching the history of the women associated with the Supreme Court, the Library of Congress sent her Malvina Harlan's unpublished manuscript. Recalling Abigail Adams's order to "remember the ladies, " Justice Ginsburg guided its long journey from forgotten document to published book.

Malvina Shanklin Harlan witnessed-and gently influenced-national history from the perspective of a political leader's wife. Ferguson, the infamous case that endorsed separate but equal segregation. And for fifty-seven years he was married to a woman who was busy making a mental record of their eventful lives. The memoir begins with Malvina, the daughter of passionate abolitionists, becoming the teenage bride of John Marshall Harlan, whose family owned more than a dozen slaves. Malvina depicts her life in antebellum Kentucky, and her courageous defense of the Harlan homestead during the Civil War. She writes of her husband's ascent in legal circles and his eventual appointment to the Supreme Court in 1877, where he was the author of opinions that continued to influence American race relations deep into the twentieth century.

Yet Some Memories is more than a wife's account of a famous and powerful man. It chronicles the remarkable evolution of a young woman from Indiana who became a keen observer of both her family's life and that of her nation. This is a special copy of a book covering an important era in our history. It would never have been published without the efforts of Justice Ginsburg, so having a copy signed by her is truly special! This copy is inscribed to Harry Cook who worked at the Supreme Court.

Please refer to the letter written by his grandson. Please review the photos and ask questions.

---