Thread by @chrisgeidner

It was only 18 years ago today that the Supreme Court held that sodomy laws—laws effectively criminalizing queer people’s lives—were unconstitutional. In other words, if you turned 18 before today, same-sex sexual activity could be prosecuted in parts of the US during your life.

While we celebrate LGBTQ Pride In many parts of the country this weekend, only people turning 18 today and after will not have lived under valid sodomy laws in parts of the country.

Lawrence v. Texas was argued in my first year of law school, and its consideration figured into the reasons why I started my Law Dork blog back in the day. It was some of my first ~considered~ writing about the law, but I’m so glad I kept learning. And wrote so much more.

Go listen to Paul Smith’s Lawrence argument, and Kennedy’s announcing of the court’s decision (and Scalia’s announcement of his dissent), here: oyez.org/cases/2002/02-…

It was only 8 years ago today that another set of Supreme Court decisions rocked the legal landscape. The Windsor decision ended DOMA’s ban on federal recognition of same-sex couples’ marriages and the Prop 8 Perry case out of California brought marriage equality to that state.

Here was my profile of Edie Windsor (and, in part, her wife, Thea Spyer, as well as Edie’s lawyer, Robbie Kaplan) from earlier in the year in 2013: buzzfeednews.com/article/chrisg…

Two days after the Prop 8 decision from the Supreme Court, which dismissed the case on standing grounds putting off a larger decision on marriage equality for the nation, marriages began in California. The lead plaintiffs were married by now-@VP Harris.

https://twitter.com/kamalaharris/status/350748832914616321

Listen to the arguments and opinion announcement in Windsor here: oyez.org/cases/2012/12-…

Listen to the arguments and opinion announcement in Perry here: oyez.org/cases/2012/12-…

Only two years later, quicker than any of us expected that June day in 2013, we were back at the Supreme Court, when — six years ago today — Justice Kennedy announced his opinion for the court in Obergefell, bringing marriage equality to the whole nation.

The decision was clear to those watching before the arguments were even held, as I wrote in January of that year. buzzfeednews.com/article/chrisg…

Shortly after the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case, I was able to fly out to Ohio — my home state — and spend the day with the plaintiff in the lead case, Jim Obergefell, who was fighting to have his marriage to John Arthur recognized by the state. buzzfeednews.com/article/chrisg…

Listen to the arguments in Obergefell and the other cases out of the 6th Circuit that were before the Supreme Court, as well as the decision announcement, here: oyez.org/cases/2014/14-…

As we saw often this year, LGBTQ people—LGB folks and same-sex couples, yes, but, on a far greater and governmental scale, transgender people—still face discrimination & legalized mistreatment. There will be more court cases, more people whose causes must be profiled, more work.

But, on this day that has repeatedly brought an end to legalized, governmental discrimination against queer people & same-sex relationships, it provides us a moment to reflect on the changes we have made — and the ways so many lives can be lived differently today because of them.