Washington, D.C.-"Caloo calllay. Oh frabjous day. The Supreme Court has gone all the way!" exulted Dr. Franklin E. Kameny, America's undisputed father of gay militancy. A U.S. government astronomer in the 1950s, Dr. Kameny had been the first gay American to challenge his dismissal by government bureaucrats who suspected he was gay. When the Court decided in early 1961 to ignore his challenge, he founded, along with GayToday's editor and a few others, the nation's first civil rights, direct action gay and lesbian organization, The Mattachine Society of Washington.

"The effort to repeal the anti-Sodomy laws, which started off softly and quietly in 1961, in Illinois, concluded today in a blaze of glory with the final overturn of all the remaining such laws by the U. S. Supreme Court, providing a major step in moving American gays into their deserved status of complete equality in all phases of life, and in their achievement of that defining, inalienable American right to the pursuit of happiness." "This is the most important victory for the gay rights movement in thirty years," according to Charles Kaiser, author of The Gay Metropolis (Harcourt), a history of gay life in America since 1940.

Dr. Frank Kameny

Charles Kaiser, Historian

Kaiser said it was especially appropriate that the decision was issued just two days before the 34th anniversary of the first Stonewall Riot in Manhattan, which started the modern struggle for gay civil rights Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund, which argued the case on behalf of all who are involved in same-sex relationships, called the Court's decision "the most significant ruling ever for lesbian and gay Americans civil rights." The Texas law struck down had criminalized oral and anal sex by consenting gay couples and in Texas and elsewhere has, for many years, been used widely to justify discrimination against lesbians and gay men.

Victorious plaintiffs Tyron Garner and John Lawrence

"This ruling effectively strikes down the sodomy laws in every state that still has them -- but its impact is even broader. It will be a powerful tool for gay people in all 50 states where we continue fighting to be treated equally." Harlow said. "For decades, these laws have been a major roadblock to equality. They've labeled the entire gay community as criminals and second-class citizens. Today, the Supreme Court ended that once and for all." The Supreme Court heard two constitutional issues in Lambda Legal's case - whether the Texas law violates the Constitution's right to privacy, and also whether it violates the Constitution's guarantee that all Americans will be treated equally under the law. Today's ruling focused on the first argument. Lambda Legal said today's ruling effectively strikes down all 13 state sodomy laws as they apply to private, consensual intimacy and also establishes, for the first time, that lesbians and gay men have fundamental privacy rights.

"Today the Supreme Court cleared the path to open the door to all those others issues as well where gays are treated as second-class…Today is a monumental day for freedom for all of America, and a huge setback to the anti-gay bigots. For the first time we who are gay are constitutionally protected and this opens the door to protections on every level." Kunst also said: "George W. Bush must also be seen as taking a beating as a result of this decision. Why? Because it was Bush who supported Republican U.S. Senator Rick Santorum's recent outburst of anti-gay bigotry over this Supreme Court decision, calling him 'inclusive.'

Activist Bob Kunst