Three years later, Massachusetts became the first state to legalize gay marriage when the Massachusetts Supreme Court ruled that same-sex couples had the right to marry in Goodridge v. The next decade saw a whirlwind of activity on the gay marriage front, beginning with the year 2000, when Vermont became the first state to legalize civil unions, a legal status that provides most of the state-level benefits of marriage. In 1998, voters approved a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage in the state. Unfortunately for these couples looking to get married, the celebration was short-lived. Chang ordered the state to stop denying licenses to same-sex couples. The act was a huge setback for the marriage equality movement, but transient good news arose three months later: Hawaii Judge Kevin S. That is, even if a state made gay marriage legal, same-sex couples still wouldn’t be able to file income taxes jointly, sponsor spouses for immigration benefits or receive spousal Social Security payments, among many other things. Congress in 1996 passed the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which President Bill Clinton signed into law.ĭOMA didn’t ban gay marriage outright, but specified that only heterosexual couples could be granted federal marriage benefits. In response to Hawaii’s 1993 court decision in Baehr v. Opponents of gay marriage, however, did not sit on their haunches. The Hawaii Supreme Court sent the case-brought by a gay male couple and two lesbian couples who were denied marriage licenses in 1990-back for further review to the lower First Circuit Court, which in 1991 originally dismissed the suit.Īs the state tried to prove that there was “compelling state interest” in justifying the ban, the case would be tied up in litigation for the next three years. Then, in 1993, the highest court in Hawaii ruled that a ban on same-sex marriage may violate that state constitution’s Equal Protection Clause-the first time a state court has ever inched toward making gay marriage legal. same-sex couples some important benefits, such as allowing partners to receive health care coverage if their significant other was employed by the D.C.
Like with San Francisco’s ordinance, D.C.’s domestic partnership status fell far short of full marriage, but it did grant D.C.
Three years later, the District of Columbia similarly passed a new law that allowed same-sex couples to register as domestic partners. In 1989, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors passed an ordinance that allowed homosexual couples and unmarried heterosexual couples to register for domestic partnerships, which granted hospital visitation rights and other benefits. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, same-sex couples saw the first signs of hope on the marriage front in a long time. Though the gay rights movement saw some advancements in the 1970s and 1980s-such as Harvey Milk becoming the first openly gay man elected to public office in the country in 1977-the fight for gay marriage made little headway for many years. Of course, numerous other same-sex couples across the country had also applied for marriage licenses over the years, but each ended in a somber note like Baker and McConnell’s case. Other states quickly followed suit: Virginia in 1975, and Florida, California and Wyoming in 1977.
In 1973, for instance, Maryland became the first state to create a law that explicitly defines marriage as a union between a man and woman, a belief held by many conservative religious groups.