As I read
today’s reporting on the closing arguments taking place today in Perry v. Schwarzenegger , the California challenge of the constitutionality of Prop 8, which banned same-sex marriage in California after it had already been legal, I realized that this has been a significant year for LGBT rights. There is certainly volumes and volumes of work required to finally secure LGBT Americans with full rights to marry, adopt, and be free from workplace discrimination. Yet reflecting on this past year, we can see that the laws are finally moving towards justice and equality.
- November of 2009, right around the time we in Maine were attempting to recover from the state’s rejection of marriage equality, the City Council of Salt Lake City, Utah passed “passed two ordinances making it illegal to discriminate against gays in housing and employment,” the LA Times reported.
- On the same day that marriage equality was rejected in Maine, Washington State voters approved an “everything but marriage” law, thus amplifying the rights accrued for the state’s domestic partner registry.
- By May 2010, both the House and the Senate had introduced a bill titled the Student Non-discrimination Act which will provide much needed protections and legal recourse for LGBT public school students. We already have such protections in Maine for our public school students, but the introduction of federal legislation will ensure that students around the country receive the same protection from harassment.
- Most recently, and although it has been 16 years too late, there is finally an end in sight for the military’s discriminatory “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy. The House and Senate Armed Services Committee voted to put in place a repeal of the policy for December 2010 upon receipt of the Pentagon’s review of the implications of the policy. This is the most significant step towards repeal of the policy since it was enacted in 1994.
Hopefully the consequence of today’s closing arguments in California will provide another bullet to this list of the progress we have witnessed this past year. In the meantime, the ACLU will continue to fight every small battle required to make sure that LGBT Americans receive equal protection under our laws.