BE THERE ON THIS IMPORTANT NIGHT IN LGBT HISTORY!!
A few minutes ago we learned that tomorrow (Wednesday) morning shortly after 9 a.m. Central Time, the U.S. Supreme Court will announce its most important LGBT rights decisions of the decade -- its decisions on equal marriage rights for same-sex couples.
Whether or not you want to get married, these decisions will mark whether or not the Court will finally decide if LGBTs are citizens in this country -- people who in all 50 states should be treated as legal equals -- or people who in many or all areas of the country can be treated as second-class citizens, open to abuse and discrimination not just in marriage, but in employment, housing, public accommodations, etc.
Specifically, the Court will announce its rulings on Section 3 of the "Defense of Marriage Act," whether same-sex married couples will get federal benefits, and California's Proposition 8, which banned equal marriage rights in that state.
The Court is widely expected to issue a narrow ruling on Prop 8, allowing same-sex couples in California and perhaps a few other additional states to marry, but refusing to recognize the equal rights -- in essence, personhood -- of LGBTs in the rest of the nation.
If they do this, they will be rejecting citizenship for LGBTs and embracing the reactionary notion of privileging "state's rights" over civil rights, something that the African American Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s rightly rejected as throwing the rights of people in the "Bible Belt" states under the bus.
Regardless of the Court's ruling tomorrow morning, at 7 PM tomorrow night, LGBTs and our allies in Chicago will join cities around the country in response -- either to reject lousy decisions that fail to acknowledge full personhood and citizenship to LGBTs, or to celebrate and demand full, immediate implementation of good decisions.
Either way, we will be in the streets on this important night in LGBT history!
