“One person—or a group—standing up for what’s right actually can change the world. Even if that wasn’t the original plan.” —Jim Obergefell
Facing a small army of news media cameras on the steps of the Supreme Court was the last place that Jim Obergefell would ever have imagined himself. But he was there—and taking a congratulatory call from President Obama—on the morning of June 26, 2015, as the named plaintiff in Obergefell v Hodges, the Supreme Court case that defined marriage equality nationwide. It was a moment that swept the triumphant hashtag #lovewins around the globe—and one that changed Obergefell’s life.
The inside story behind that historic Supreme Court decision is one of law and love. Perhaps more powerful than legal briefs and court strategy in Obergefell v Hodges was a promise made to a dying man who wanted to know how he would be remembered.
Twenty years ago, Jim Obergefell and John Arthur fell in love in Cincinnati, a place where gays were routinely picked up by police and fired from their jobs. In 2013, the Supreme Court ruled that the federal government had to provide married gay couples all the benefits offered to all other couples. Obergefell and Arthur, who was dying from ALS, charted a medical plane and flew to Maryland, where same-sex marriage was legal, and were married on the tarmac of a Baltimore airport. But Ohio refused to recognize their union, or even list Obergefell’s name on Arthur’s death certificate when he died three months after the marriage. Cincinnati attorney Al Gerhardstein saw an opening and took on the fight for what became the most important gay rights case in U.S. history.
That fight transformed Obergefell into what he terms an “accidental activist,” and he and co-author Debbie Cenziper, a Pulitzer Prize-winning Washington Post journalist, tell the story of that process in their new book, Love Wins: The Lovers and Lawyers Who Fought the Landmark Case for Marriage Equality (William Morrow). In a conversation with NPR’s American Legal Affairs Correspondent Nina Totenberg they discuss what went on behind the scenes in the groundbreaking battle for marriage equality, and how a case fueled by the most personal of reasons led to Obergefell being named by Politico as one of the 50 top visionaries of 2015.
Love Wins is available for signing.
Other Connections
See the marriage ceremony at the center of Obergefell v Hodges, part of a brief news documentary about John Arthur and Jim Obergefell produced by the Cincinnati Enquirer.
