I’m a “glass half full” kind of guy, but it hasn’t been easy these past two months to feel optimistic about prospects for LGBT equality in Michigan.
That’s because we’ve seen a sadly high number of bad case decisions. Consider some of the rulings we’ve endured this summer:
Forty-five years after the American Civil Liberties Union filed the first-ever freedom-to-marry lawsuit in 1970, the US Supreme Court on June 26, 2015, struck down discriminatory marriage bans in Michigan and three other states, its historic decision securing marriage equality for gay and lesbian couples all across the country.
The ruling invalidates discriminatory laws in Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio, and Tennessee upheld by the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals, and as a practical matter, requires all 50 states to allow same-sex couples to marry.
As I lay in my sleeping bag on the sidewalk outside the Supreme Court on Monday in line for Tuesday’s marriage equality argument, my mind was racing. Primarily, I marveled about how far we’ve come as a society in recognizing the dignity and rights of gay people in such a short period of time.
Almost one year ago, I looked into the eyes of Glenna, the woman I have loved for 27 years and said those two magical words that would forever seal our union as one.It was a long time coming. But on that day, Glenna and I unintentionally made history when we became the first same-sex couple to legally marry in the state of Michigan.
Just the day before, Judge Friedman struck down Michigan’s marriage ban. That ruling was stayed, then appealed to the 6th Circuit which reversed the decision, and is now before the U.S. Supreme Court.
In a victory for marriage equality, a federal judge ruled on January 15, 2015 that the state of Michigan must recognize the legal marriages of 300 same-sex couples who were wed in March after a federal judge struck down the state’s ban on marriage equality and before the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals put the decision on hold.
A government official writes a hateful blog about a gay activist. A high school teacher is suspended for removing students for anti-gay slurs. A couple college kids burn a rainbow flag during Pride week.
As the staff attorney for the Lesbian Gay Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) Project here at the ACLU, I’m often asked to comment on situations that pit bigoted speech against LGBT equality.
