The Face of the Case: Obergefell Tells How He Became Part of Legal History

James Obergefell grew up in a blue collar, Catholic family in Sandusky, Ohio, got an undergraduate degree from the University of Cincinnati, and became a high school teacher.

“I was deep in the closet,” he said as he told his story during a program Wednesday, Sept. 18, 2024, in the Lubar Center at Marquette Law School. He came out in the early 1990s while he was in graduate school and met John Arthur. Within a short time, they considered themselves married. Legally, they were not – at the time, same sex marriage was not legal anywhere in the United States. But beginning in the mid -990s, they decided they wanted “marriage and everything that came with it,” as Obergefell put it.

Obergefell told Derek Mosley. executive director of the Law School’s Lubar Center for Public Policy Research and Civic Education, who moderated the conversation before a capacity audience of more than 200. how the legal landscape began to change, including a US Supreme Court decision in 2013 that struck down a federal law known as the Defense of Marriage Act. During the same period, Arthur’s health declined sharply after being he was diagnosed with ALS in 2012.

After the Supreme Court decision, Obergefell and Arthur decided to get married. Because Arthur’s health was so precarious, they needed to act quickly. And because legalities involving marriage varied across the country, they ended up taking a medical ambulance flight to the Baltimore/Washington airport in Maryland, where they could have a ceremony without ever getting off the airplane. Three months later, Arthur died.

What emerged from their marriage was a court case focused on whether Obergefell was the surviving spouse legally. And that case was joined with similar cases that ended up before the US Supreme Court, resulting in the landmark decision of Obergefell v. Hodges in 2015 which made same sex marriage legal throughout the United States. Obergefell recounted the events of the day the Supreme Court decision was issued. “I burst into tears” in the courtroom, he said. “For the first time in my life as an out gay man, I felt like an equal American,” he said. The audience applauded when he said that.   

Obergefell’s name became a big part of American legal history. And Obergefell himself moved from being a person of no prominence and no notable involvement as an activist into a continuing spotlight. It made him, as Mosley put it at the Law School program, “the face of the case,” someone who continues to be an advocate for rights of many kinds and someone who tells his personal story openly and with impact. Obergefell said he has realized how “stories matter — stories can change hearts and minds.”

“Going through something like this has a profound impact,” Obergefell told the audience. “It changes you.”

Obergefell said he is still motivated by anger over things he sees as wrong and the need to advocate for the rights of people facing many different situations. He also has less intense involvements, such as co-owning a wine label that has raised more than $250,000 for causes supported by him and the co-owner.

“Nothing makes me happier than to know that young people today are growing up in a world where the question of their right, their ability, to get married and have that relationship recognized is there.” Obergefell said.  “I had the absolute honor and privilege of being part of making things better for people younger than I am.”

Video of the one-hour program may be viewed by clicking below.

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Moot Court Team Reaches Quarterfinals in Los Angeles

Marquette’s Labor and Employment Law Moot Court team wasn’t the only Marquette moot court to reach quarterfinals in a competition in March.

Team members Annie Gonring and Ron Tenuta successfully argued their way into quarterfinals at the UCLA Williams Institute National Moot Court Competition. Their quarterfinal round ended up being a re-match of one of their preliminaries rounds, against a competitive team.

Although Gonring and Tenuta did not advance to the semifinals, they did achieve high oral argument scores from the judges, with Gonring, in particular, named by several judges as an outstanding oralist. Their brief also tied for third place in the competition.

Madeline Lewis and Aimeé Treviño—Marquette’s other team—did not advance past the preliminary round, but they put in strong performances, with Trevino named by one judge as the best advocate in her round.

This marked Marquette’s first time in this competition and our two teams showed that Marquette was a presence to contend with.

The team was advised by Professor Lisa Mazzie, and coached by Attorneys Alexa Bradley (L’18), Bryn Baker (L’18), and Courtney Roelandts (L’18).

(From left to right) Madeline Lewis, Aimeé Treviño, Annie Gonring, and Ron Tenuta pose next to a bust of Abraham Lincoln at UCLA Law School.
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Texas Deputies and S.B. 8

If you’re like the rest of the United States, then you are aware of the recent attempts to restrict the right to abortion pre-viability — a right affirmed by the Supreme Court in Planned Parenthood v Casey., 505 U.S. 833. Despite the holding in Planned Parenthood, States continue to pass legislation restricting abortion. In some States, these attempts are no more than a brazen attempt to ban nontherapeutic pre-viability abortions.

By the end of 2021, some fifteen States had passed legislation that banned non-therapeutic pre-viability abortions, commonly referred to as “Heartbeat bills.” (As of this writing, the states are Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Idaho, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Texas.) Though neither the progenitor nor the ultimate occurrence, S.B. 8, passed by Texas’s legislature and signed into law by Governor Abbott, has created rather significant waves in the legal landscape. Perhaps predictably, other States have emulated Texas’s approach, an approach that some commentators call the most restrictive abortion legislation to be passed post-Roe v. Wade (410 U.S. 113). A quick perusal of one’s favorite internet search engine will reveal the myriad commentary discussing the ways in which Texas and other States have been ingeniously skirting the dictates of the Supreme Court.

So, what is it that makes Texas’s legislation so newsworthy? Truly, it is not the restrictions that Texas has imposed that makes this law exceptional. After all, States have been passing restrictions on abortion long before the right was recognized by the Supreme Court. It is, also, not the fact that Texas is attempting to make it impossible for women, other than victims of rape and incest, to obtain an abortion once a heartbeat is detected; Texas is hardly novel in its endeavors in this area. What makes Senate Bill 8 so exceptional is its novel enforcement scheme.

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