I’m getting married next month, and I can’t overstate just how happy I am about it. There won’t be a big ceremony, nor will there be a lavish reception or extravagant honeymoon. There will simply be me, there will be my fiancée, and there will be a legal document telling the world what we’ve known all along: that we are two women who are madly in love and plan to stay that way for the next half-century or so. It’s almost hard to believe that just a few short years ago, none of this would be possible.

Edith Windsor helped change all that, for me and for millions of others. Sadly, the 88-year-old plaintiff in the landmark 2013 Supreme Court ruling that struck down the Defense of Marriage Act and paved the way for full marriage equality died on Tuesday in New York, survived by her wife, Judith Kasen-Windsor.

In 2007, after a 40-year engagement, Windsor married Dr. Thea Spyer in Canada. When Spyer died two years later, Windsor inherited her estate. Rather than receiving tax benefits and exemptions ordinarily afforded to surviving spouses, she was hit with more than $363,000 in taxes simply because she married a woman (thanks to DOMA’s stipulation that same-sex couples were barred from receiving legal recognition as spouses on a federal level). It wasn’t fair, and Windsor wasn’t about to go down without a fight.

The case, which argued that same-sex couples were being singled out and deprived equal treatment under the law, was affirmed by the Supreme Court in a 5-4 ruling, helping to set up the 2015 Obergefell v. Hodges decision that would effectively make marriage equality the law of the land, nationwide. The victory was a stunning and somewhat unexpected win for the lesbian, gay, and bisexual rights movement. Though Windsor’s own personal advocacy went back decades, casual observers could be forgiven for thinking that the leap forward happened overnight.

“Married is a magic word,” Windsor said at a 2009 rally outside City Hall in Manhattan. “And it is magic throughout the world. It has to do with our dignity as human beings, to be who we are openly. People see us differently. We heard from hundreds of people, from every stage of our lives, pouring out congratulations. Thea looks at her ring every day and thinks of herself as a member of a special species that can love and couple, ‘until death do us part.’”

Thanks to Windsor, to Obergefell, to gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, and queer activists going back decades, we all now have access to that “magic,” and to that “dignity” she spoke of. This isn’t to say that Windsor’s or Obergefell’s cases were some great end point for L.G.B.T.Q rights—if there’s one thing the Trump administration has demonstrated in its first months in office, it’s that those of us who care about equality must remain vigilant in fighting to protect what gains have been made and working to expand them. These wins demonstrate that victories once seen as impossible are, in fact, within reach.

Just 20 years ago, only 27 percent of Americans thought same-sex marriages should have legal recognition. Now, that number stands at 64 percent and continues to climb. Windsor’s victory is a shining example of what it looks like to never give up on love, even in the face of some very long odds.

So when I get married next month, with a smile on my face and love in my heart, I’ll be thinking fondly of Edith Windsor, the woman who helped make it all possible.

Related Stories:

Supreme Court Declares Gay Marriage Is a Right

Source link