A Short History of Gay Marriage, Which Turns 10 Today
CAMBRIDGE, Mass.Ten years ago today in Massachusetts, same-sex couples began to marry, becoming the first ones to do so in the United States. Opponents had predicted everything from familial destruction to the downfall of Western civilization. But what I saw that early morning when men and women began to have the right to say their vows in Cambridge, Mass., was sheer giddiness.
Eager to be first, officials had kept Cambridge City Hall open late Sunday night so that it could issue licenses precisely at 12:01 a.m. Monday. Hundreds of people turned out for what felt like a street party, lit by the news truckss klieg lights. Along with jubilant gays and lesbians, throngs of straight people werethrilled to be witnesses to a new American first. In Arlington, one town over, same-sex newlyweds were handed roses by strangers as they exited the Town Hall. The next day, an acquaintance with a deep Boston accent called to tell me she was keeping her kids home from school to witness her towns first same-sex weddings. How often do they get to see history? she gushed. Equality gives me goosebumps!
It all happened so fast. And yet the success of the gay marriage movement never seemed as obvious along the way as it does now.
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