Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/14pdf/14-556_3204.pdf
Page Number: 30

Cite as:  576 U. S. ____ (2015) 

25 

Opinion of the Court 

It  is  of  no  moment  whether  advocates  of  same-sex  mar-
riage  now  enjoy  or  lack  momentum  in  the  democratic 
process.  The issue before the Court here is the legal ques-
tion  whether  the  Constitution  protects  the  right  of  same-
sex couples to marry.

This  is  not  the  first  time  the  Court  has  been  asked  to 
adopt  a  cautious  approach  to  recognizing  and  protecting 
fundamental rights.  In Bowers, a bare majority upheld a
law  criminalizing  same-sex  intimacy.    See  478  U. S.,  at 
186, 190–195.  That approach might have been viewed as
a  cautious  endorsement  of  the  democratic  process,  which
had  only  just  begun  to  consider  the  rights  of  gays  and
lesbians.  Yet,  in  effect,  Bowers  upheld  state  action  that
denied gays and lesbians a fundamental right and caused 
them pain and humiliation.  As evidenced by the dissents 
in that case, the facts and principles necessary to a correct
holding were known to the Bowers Court.  See id., at 199 
(Blackmun, J., joined by Brennan, Marshall, and Stevens,
JJ., dissenting); id., at 214 (Stevens, J., joined by Brennan
and Marshall, JJ., dissenting).  That is why Lawrence held 
Bowers was “not correct when it was decided.”  539 U. S., 
at  578.  Although  Bowers  was  eventually  repudiated  in 
Lawrence,  men  and  women  were  harmed  in  the  interim, 
and  the  substantial  effects  of  these  injuries  no  doubt 
lingered  long  after  Bowers  was  overruled.  Dignitary
wounds cannot always be healed with the stroke of a pen. 

A ruling against same-sex couples would have the same 
effect—and,  like  Bowers,  would  be  unjustified  under  the
Fourteenth  Amendment.  The  petitioners’  stories  make
clear  the  urgency  of  the  issue  they  present  to  the  Court. 
James  Obergefell  now  asks  whether  Ohio  can  erase  his
marriage  to  John  Arthur  for  all  time.    April  DeBoer  and
Jayne Rowse now ask whether Michigan may continue to 
deny them the certainty and stability all mothers desire to
protect their children, and for them and their children the
childhood  years  will  pass  all  too  soon.    Ijpe  DeKoe  and