This article first appeared in our Winter 2013 newsletter. We are running it here to celebrate one year since marriage equality became the law in Maine, and to celebrate the first anniversary of the first couples to get married under the new law as well as all those who have married since. Happy anniversary!

A few weeks ago I listened as two people who have been together for decades described how their lives have changed since they got married in July. Mostly it's in the details: they save a few hundred dollars each month in health care costs. They no longer cart around a huge pile of paperwork everywhere they go to prove their relationship to each other. They call each other spouse, not partner.

But more importantly, there’s this: their seventh grade daughter no longer has to  wonder why her family is treated as somehow "less than" other families. And for that, said one of the women, "what a difference a year makes.”

It's true. A little more than a year ago, Maine voters spoke loud and clear with their ballots, proclaiming that in this state we don't treat people differently because of who they love. A year ago, couples who had been together for decades learned that they could finally, legally, get married to each other. A year ago this month, the first couples did. A year ago Washington and Maryland approved marriage equality too. And then the legislatures in Delaware, Minnesota, Rhode Island, Illinois and Hawaii did. Marriage equality is winning in the courts, too, like it did this year in California and New Jersey.

One year after Maine became the first state to win marriage equality at the ballot box, our state - and our country - is better because of it. Not one of the consequences predicted by opponents of the law have come true: no political agenda is being forced upon our children; people of faith are not being discriminated against; the sanctity of my own, heterosexual marriage remains intact.

This does not mean the fight is over: there will be other battles that will require the same commitment and energy that Mainers poured into marriage equality. In the coming session, for example, the legislature will consider a sweeping religious exemption bill that would undermine Maine's anti-discrimination laws by allowing people to circumvent the rules in the name of religious freedom. The ACLU of Maine is dedicated to upholding religious freedom, but this bill goes far beyond that. Look for updates from us as this bill moves in Augusta.

But for now, let’s celebrate: Happy first anniversary of a time when Maine made history. What a difference a year makes!