Wedding Bells by Linda Greenhouse
Thinking about the same-sex marriage cases that the court will hear next week, it occurred to me to see whether Justice Blackmun, who annotated nearly every piece of paper that came across his desk, had recorded any thoughts about a case that arrived at the court in 1971, Baker v. Nelson.
It was the first appeal to reach the court claiming a right to same-sex marriage. Jack Baker was a student at the University of Minnesota, where he was a well-known gay-rights activist, when he and his partner, James McConnell, showed up at the county clerk’s office to apply for a marriage license. The year was 1970. Minnesota law set out the logistics for obtaining a license and marrying in the state, but contained no explicit requirement that members of the couple be of the opposite sex. Nonetheless, and not surprisingly, the county clerk turned them down. . .
The point of recounting this history at a moment when talk of same-sex marriage seems to be everywhere is to underscore how much has changed without the Supreme Court’s ever addressing the issue directly. . .
Jack Baker and James McConnell, who had the nerve to talk about marriage before even people of good will like Harry Blackmun were able to hear them, have grown old watching the issue evolve. Now in their early 70s, they still live in Minnesota, and more than 40 years later, they are still a couple.
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/03/20/wedding-bells/?hp
