New from Harvard University Press:
Awakening: How Gays and Lesbians Brought Marriage Equality to America, by
Nathaniel Frank (Columbia Law School). A description from the Press:
The right of same-sex couples to marry provoked decades of intense
conflict before it was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2015. Yet
some of the most divisive contests shaping the quest for marriage
equality occurred not on the culture-war front lines but within the
ranks of LGBTQ advocates. Nathaniel Frank tells the dramatic
story of how an idea that once seemed unfathomable—and for many gays and
lesbians undesirable—became a legal and moral right in just half a
century.
Awakening begins in the 1950s, when millions of gays and
lesbians were afraid to come out, let alone fight for equality. Across
the social upheavals of the next two decades, a gay rights movement
emerged with the rising awareness of the equal dignity of same-sex love.
A cadre of LGBTQ lawyers soon began to focus on legal recognition for
same-sex couples, if not yet on marriage itself. It was only after being
pushed by a small set of committed lawyers and grassroots activists
that established movement groups created a successful strategy to win
marriage in the courts.
Marriage equality proponents then had to win over members of their
own LGBTQ community who declined to make marriage a priority, while
seeking to rein in others who charged ahead heedless of their carefully
laid plans. All the while, they had to fight against virulent antigay
opponents and capture the American center by spreading the simple
message that love is love, ultimately propelling the LGBTQ community—and
America—immeasurably closer to justice.
More information is available
here.
