In 2008, as the 27th District Attorney of San Francisco, Kamala Harris attended an event at the San Francisco LGBT Center supporting marriage equality. Among those standing behind her is, at the far left, San Francisco Bay Times columnist John Lewis. He and his husband Stuart Gaffney previously wrote in the Bay Times about Harris’ longstanding support for the LGBTQ+ community and marriage equality.
2008 was a pivotal year in the marriage equality movement. From June 16 to November 5 of that year—a period of 4 months and 20 days—the State of California first issued marriage licenses to same-sex couples. This was as a result of the Supreme Court of California finding that barring same-sex couples from marriage violated the state’s Constitution. The passage of Proposition 8 halted the issuance of the licenses. They were reinstated on June 26, 2013.
On that day in 2013, Harris said, in part, “It is gratifying to see the highest court in the land deliver an across-the-board victory for equality and justice today. Edith Windsor deserved to have her marriage recognized by the United States, and today’s decision is a historic step forward in the fight for civil rights for same-sex couples across this country.”
Windsor, who died in 2017, was the lead plaintiff in the case United States v. Windsor, which overturned Section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act and was a landmark legal victory in the same-sex marriage movement in the U.S. Same-sex marriage became legal nationwide on June 26, 2015, after a Supreme Court ruling in another high-profile case: Obergefell v. Hodges. Lewis and Gaffney—and Harris—fought for U.S. marriage equality all those years, never wavering in their desire for social justice. Lewis and Gaffney still fight for marriage equality rights worldwide.
Rink Throwback: Kamala Harris
Published on September 19, 2024
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