The freedom to marry belongs to all Americans;
Marriage is one of our "vital personal rights," and;
The right to marry is "essential to the orderly pursuit of happiness by a free people."
--Loving v. Virginia, 388 U.S. 1, 1967, overturning the state’s ban on interracial marriages

With legal marriage now available to same-sex couples in Ontario and British Columbia, Canada and potentially in Massachusetts, it is now more important than ever that every American who believes in equality be heard in Congress and in our state governments. This is an incredibly exciting time, and we should all celebrate these developments. We also need to prepare for the fact that those who oppose GLBT equality are now more highly motivated than ever to work to stop further advancement of marriage equality and other efforts to ensure fair treatment for GLBT Americans. 

It is vitally important that we take action now to influence public policy and shape public opinion about equal marriage rights.

Marriage equality is a basic civil rights issue that we need to protect and advance. That is why it is so important that a proposed Constitutional amendment to ban recognition of marriages between same-sex couples in the United States not succeed. It is the ultimate trump card and the ultimate mechanism to build discrimination into the very document that should protect everyone. Such an amendment would be used by our opponents to not only negate any victories already achieved in courts but also to foreclose the future possibility of appealing to courts to secure marriage equality. Further, it would be used in the same way the sodomy laws were used prior to the Supreme Court’s decision in the Texas sodomy case of Lawrence v. Texas – to justify other forms of discrimination.

For more information visit the HRC Marriage Center!