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Ginsburg remembered her “best buddy” as someone who both revered the Constitution and the Supreme Court.
“Justice Scalia once described as the peak of his days on the bench an evening at the Opera Ball when he joined two Washington National Opera tenors at the piano for a medley of songs. He called it the famous Three Tenors performance,” she said in a statement on Sunday. “He was, indeed, a magnificent performer. It was my great good fortune to have known him as working colleague and treasured friend.”
During a joint appearance with the woman he also has called his “best buddy” on the bench, Scalia said, “Why don’t you call us the odd couple?”
“What’s not to like?” Scalia joked at the event hosted by the Smithsonian Associates. “Except her views on the law, of course.”
The two justices and their families vacationed together. There was a trip to Europe where Ginsburg went parasailing, leaving Scalia on the ground to admire her courage but at the same time worry she might just float away.
Photos: Today's Supreme Court
The justices of the US Supreme Court sit for an official photograph on June 1, 2017. In the front row, from left, are Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Anthony Kennedy, Chief Justice John Roberts, Clarence Thomas and Stephen Breyer. In the back row, from left, are Elena Kagan, Samuel Alito, Sonia Sotomayor and Neil Gorsuch.
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Photos: Today's Supreme Court
In 2005, John Roberts was nominated by President George W. Bush to succeed Sandra Day O'Connor as an associate justice on the US Supreme Court. After Chief Justice William Rehnquist died, Bush named Roberts to the chief justice post. The court has moved to the right during Roberts' tenure, although Roberts supplied the key vote to uphold Barack Obama's Affordable Care Act.
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Anthony Kennedy was appointed to the court by President Ronald Reagan in 1988. He is a conservative justice but has provided crucial swing votes in many cases. He has authored landmark opinions that include Obergefell v. Hodges, which legalized same-sex marriage nationwide.
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Clarence Thomas is the second African-American to serve on the court, succeeding Thurgood Marshall when he was appointed by President George H. W. Bush in 1991. Thomas is a conservative and a strict constructionist who supports states' rights.
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Ruth Bader Ginsburg is the second woman to serve on the Supreme Court. Appointed by President Bill Clinton in 1993, she is a strong voice in the court's liberal wing.
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Stephen Breyer was appointed by Clinton in 1994 and is part of the court's liberal wing.
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Samuel Alito was appointed by President George W. Bush in 2006 and is known as one of the most conservative justices to serve on the court in modern times.
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Sonia Sotomayor is the court's first Hispanic and third female justice. She was appointed by Obama in 2009 and is regarded as a resolutely liberal member of the court.
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Elena Kagan is the fourth female justice to ever be appointed, and she is counted among the court's liberal wing. She was appointed by Obama in 2010 at the age of 50. She is the court's youngest member.
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Neil Gorsuch is the court's newest member. He was chosen by President Donald Trump to replace Antonin Scalia, who died in 2016.
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In her chambers, she has a picture of them riding an elephant in India. Ginsburg – the pioneer of gender equality– has said that she was only sitting behind Scalia to distribute weight more evenly on the elephant.
Ginsburg’s late husband, Martin Ginsburg, was a gourmet chef, and the two justices often spent New Year’s Eve together celebrating with their spouses.
They never shied away from the fact that they didn’t often agree in many opinions.
It was Ginsburg who wrote the landmark 1996 case, United States v. Virginia. The opinion struck down the all-male admissions policy at the Virginia Military Institute. Scalia dissented, but he offered her an advanced look at his dissent in order to improve her majority opinion.
She often said that having the dissent ruined her weekend but made her final product better.
They disagreed on same-sex marriage and wound up on opposite ends of the case. Ginsburg welcomed the swift change that swept across the country and brought the issue to the Supreme Court. Scalia believed fervently that the issue should be decided by the people, not the courts.
He wrote a biting dissent when the court cleared the way for gay marriage last spring.
“The issue is quite simply who decides, that’s all,” he said at the Smithsonian event.
But he respected Ginsburg for the kind of judge she is, offering clear and concise guidance to the lower courts.
“I love him, but sometimes I’d like to strangle him,” Ginsburg once said, according to Reuters.
Photos: Justice Antonin Scalia's life in photos
U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, who was found dead on Saturday, February 13, was one of the most influential conservative justices in history. He was 79.
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Photos: Justice Antonin Scalia's life in photos
President Ronald Reagan announces the nomination of Scalia to the Supreme Court on June 17, 1986, as a result of Chief Justice Warren E. Burger's retirement.
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Photos: Justice Antonin Scalia's life in photos
Scalia works in his office in Washington on July 28, 1986. Scalia, who was appointed in 1986, was the longest-serving justice on the Supreme Court.
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Scalia appears before the Senate Judiciary Committee during his confirmation hearings in Washington on August 6, 1986.
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Scalia, seen in a 1986 photo, was the first justice of Italian-American heritage and passed through confirmation with a unanimous vote.
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Photos: Justice Antonin Scalia's life in photos
Retiring Chief Justice Warren Burger, right, administers the oath to Scalia, as Scalia's wife, Maureen, holds the Bible on September 26, 1986. Scalia was the 103rd person to sit on the court.
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Photos: Justice Antonin Scalia's life in photos
U.S. Supreme Court justices pay their respects in front of the casket of former Chief Justice Warren E. Burger during a prayer ceremony in the Great Hall at the Supreme Court Building in Washington on June 28, 1995.
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Photos: Justice Antonin Scalia's life in photos
Scalia speaks to a crowd gathered at the Religious Freedom Monument in Fredericksburg, Virginia, to celebrate Religious Freedom Day on January 12, 2003. Scalia complained that courts have gone overboard in keeping God out of government.
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Scalia shakes hands with U.S. Marines Corps Maj. Gen. Robert C. Dickerson, commanding general, upon Scalia's arrival at Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, for an official visit on March 12, 2004.
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Photos: Justice Antonin Scalia's life in photos
Scalia speaks to Presbyterian Christian High School students in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, April 7, 2004.
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Photos: Justice Antonin Scalia's life in photos
The casket of Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist lies in the Great Hall of the U.S. Supreme Court as Scalia and Sandra Day O'Connor, left, walk past on September 6, 2005, in Washington.
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Photos: Justice Antonin Scalia's life in photos
Members of the U.S. Supreme Court, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Justice Stephen Breyer, Justice Clarence Thomas, Justice David Souter, Justice William Kennedy, Justice Antonin Scalia, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor and Justice John Paul Stevens file out of the U.S. Supreme Court Building to attend funeral services for Chief Justice William Rehnquist on September 7, 2005, in Washington.
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Photos: Justice Antonin Scalia's life in photos
Surrounded by security, Scalia walks in the annual Columbus Day Parade on October 10, 2005, in New York City.
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Photos: Justice Antonin Scalia's life in photos
Scalia calls on people during a question-and-answer period at the American Enterprise Institute on February 21, 2006, in Washington. Scalia delivered the keynote address about foreign law and the debate about how it is used in American Law during the seminar called "Outsourcing Of American Law."
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Heather Myklegard, Scalia, Dirk Kempthorne and U.S. President George W. Bush walk through the Rose Garden before Kempthorne is sworn in as the new interior secretary at White House on June 7, 2006, in Washington.
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Photos: Justice Antonin Scalia's life in photos
Scalia listens as U.S. President George W. Bush speaks at the the Federalist Society's 25th Anniversary Gala Dinner at Union Station in Washington, on November 15, 2007.
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Photos: Justice Antonin Scalia's life in photos
Scalia speaks during the American Bar Association's 59th annual antitrust law spring meeting in Washington on March 31, 2011.
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Scalia testifies during a hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee on October 5, 2011. The justice testified on "Considering the Role of Judges Under the Constitution of the United States."
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Scalia and his wife, Maureen, arrive for a state dinner in honor of British Prime Minister David Cameron at the White House on March 14, 2012, in Washington.
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Scalia conducts a naturalization ceremony for 16 new U.S. citizens during the commemoration of the 150th anniversary of President Abraham Lincoln's historic Gettysburg Address on November 19, 2013, at Gettysburg National Military Park in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.
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Photos: Justice Antonin Scalia's life in photos
U.S. President Barack Obama greets Supreme Court Justices Clarence Thomas, Antonin Scalia, Sonia Sotomayor, Anthony Kennedy and John Roberts at Obama's inauguration for his second term of office.
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Photos: Justice Antonin Scalia's life in photos
Scalia speaks at the University of Minnesota as part of the law school's Stein Lecture series on October 20, 2015, in Minneapolis.
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As close as their friendship was, they never went duck hunting together. Justice Elena Kagan got that honor. After she joined the court, Scalia taught her to shoot. They started out with clay pigeons and later moved to deer, antelope and ducks.
Scalia frequently appeared at events hosted by the conservative Federalist Society, where he would be greeted with a standing ovation. Once he brought all nine of his children on stage with him.
Ginsburg’s standing ovations come from the more liberal American Constitution Society. Last Friday she went to the ribbon cutting of the new law school at American University, praising the school that had been founded by women.
“Brilliant thinkers, they loved a good joke, the law and opera,” said Arnold & Porter lawyer Lisa S. Blatt, a former clerk of Ginsburg.
Blatt, who argues frequently before the court, often found herself the recipient of tough questions from both justices.
“They had the world in common,” Blatt said.
Scalia was also the subject of a one-man play, “The Originalist, ” recently at the Arena Stage theater in Washington.
Actor Edward Gero did an uncanny job in capturing Scalia’s mannerisms. Scalia took it all in stride, referring to it as the “age of celebrity” and telling the Smithsonian audience he would not be going to see the play.
But Ginsburg revealed his more personal side, noting that he had gone out of his way to have lunch with Gero. He also invited him to oral arguments.
Ginsburg and Scalia were also the subject of an opera, “Scalia/Ginsburg,” composed by Derrick Wang. It had its debut last spring.
At speaking events, Ginsburg often delighted in reading excerpts from the opening aria of the Scalia character: “The Justices are blind! How can they possibly spout this/The Constitution says absolutely nothing about this.”
