The Supreme Court granted certiorari; it was the first explicitly homosexual rights case to be heard before the Court since 1967 in the pre-Stonewall era (although the "Bowers v. Hardwick" sodomy laws case had been heard the year before). The SFAA was represented before the court by openly gay San Francisco attorney Mary Dunlap. It was also represented by the American Civil Liberties Union. The USOC was represented by well-known Washington trial lawyer Edward Bennett Williams.