After marriage ruling, Ct. State House rally draws jubilant crowd

It was a display of civic pride not normally seen at an LGBT gathering: a brigade of students from the University of Connecticut's Rainbow Center bunched up in front of the Connecticut State House on Oct. 10, chanting at full throat "UConn Huskies! UConn Huskies! UConn Huskies!" as the crowd around them broke into applause and cheers. Moments later, the Husky lovers gave way to the issue at hand, with repeated chants of "Two women, two men, Connecticut says we can!" thus causing the surrounding crowd once again to burst into whooping applause. Bobbing up above the throng were handheld signs that proclaimed "Proud of my state," "47 more to go, Thank you Connecticut!" "Equality and nothing less" and "We're gonna get married (again)" -- an apparent reference to the ceremonial do-over that will be required of couples that were previously united under the state's civil union law but now wish to legally marry.

"We did it! We did it!" said Anne Stanback, executive director of Love Makes A Family, the organization that has lead the effort to secure marriage equality in Connecticut, said to wild applause. "This is an amazing day in Connecticut, a historic day, and so many people were involved in this victory," she added, before turning the microphone over to Lee Swislow, the executive director of Gay and Lesbian Advocates Defenders (GLAD), the organization that litigated Kerrigan and Mock v. Connecticut Department of Public Health, the lawsuit that brought marriage equality to the state.

And though it was hardly a chore, Swislow succeeded in whipping the crowd up all over again. "This is an incredible day, because we won!" she said. "And it's not GLAD who won, it's our plaintiffs who won, it's every single person out here who won, it's the entire state of Connecticut who won."

It was also clear that Ben Klein is the new Mary Bonauto. Klein, the GLAD attorney who argued on behalf of the Kerrigan case before the Connecticut Supreme Court last year -- just as Bonauto successfully argued Goodridge before the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court in 2003 -- received a hero's welcome, stepping to the microphone amid thundering chants of "Ben! Ben! Ben! Ben!"

"After four years of litigation and after seventeen months waiting for a decision in this case, there's not much left for a lawyer to say. But the only thing I do want to say is, what a great day for equality and justice in this state."

Not surprisingly, several of the eight plaintiff couples who spoke at the rally are already planning their nuptials, as same-sex couples are expected to be able to get marriage licenses in early November (See "Prospects for overturning Connecticut's marriage decision are dim," p. 1)

"We've been engaged for twenty-eight years," said plaintiff Garrett Stack of Woodbridge, of his relationship with John Anderson, "and we are registering for Home Depot and getting' ready for one big wedding."

Janet Peck and Carole Conklin, a plaintiff couple from Colchester, are planning a wedding after more than three decades together. "We're both absolutely thrilled by the decision today; that the Supreme Court has recognized that thirty years is too long for somebody to wait to get married.

"Now today in Connecticut, as of this day, we're no longer second-class citizens we're going to be treated as full and equal citizens of this great state," Peck continued. "And I am absolutely looking forward to the day when I can take this woman's hand, look deeply into her eyes and pledge my support and my commitment to her in marriage.

"My heart has ached for that moment and today I know that dream is going to come true," she added, "and that ache will be replaced by wonderful joy."