The Rocky Mountain Collegian

Issue date: 2/6/09 Section: News

In this Oct. 23, 2008 file photo, Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg reads from a small book version of the U.S. Constitution while talking about constitutional law in Princeton, N.J. Ginsburg has been hospitalized for surgery for pancreatic cancer. (AP Photo/Mel Evans, File)

WASHINGTON (AP) - Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg had surgery Thursday for pancreatic cancer, raising the possibility that one of the ideologically divided court's leading liberals - and its only woman - might have to curtail her work or even step down before she had planned.

Ginsburg, 75, has been a justice since 1993. She has been increasingly vocal in recent years about the court's more conservative stances, especially after the appointments made by President George W. Bush.

Pancreatic cancer is often deadly, although the court said doctors apparently found Ginsburg's growth at an early stage.

In 1999, she had colon cancer surgery, underwent radiation and chemotherapy, and never missed a day on the bench. Statistics suggest this could be a tougher fight.

Ginsburg had the surgery at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York. She will remain in the hospital for seven to 10 days, said her surgeon, Dr. Murray Brennan, according to a release issued by the court. The hospital had no comment.

The justices hold their next private conference on Feb. 20 and return to the bench from their winter break on Feb. 23.

President Barack Obama expressed hope for her speedy recovery, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said Thursday, and offered his thoughts and prayers.

Ginsburg is only the second female justice in the nation's history. The other was Sandra Day O'Connor, who retired in 2006, and Ginsburg has lamented being the only woman on the court.

In the spring of 2007, she vented her frustration with the court's increasingly conservative tone by writing two sharp dissents that were made even more notable by her decision to read from them in the courtroom.

Objecting to a decision that upheld a nationwide ban on an abortion procedure that opponents call partial-birth abortion, Ginsburg said the ruling "cannot be understood as anything other than an effort to chip away at a right declared again and again by this court - and with increasing comprehension of its centrality to women's lives."

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