Strangers to the law

In 1992, Colorado voters passed a ballot initiative amending their state constitution to prevent the state or any local government from adopting any law or policy that would protect lesbians, gay men, and bisexuals from discrimination. Emblematic of the "cultural wars" flaring up over the civil rights of gay people, proponents hailed Colorado's amendment 2 as an end to "special rights" while opponents attacked it as a danger to civil society. A lawsuit filed immediately after its passage challenged the Colorado amendment as a denial of equal protection of the laws under the United States Constitution. This litigation ultimately led to a landmark decision by the United States Supreme Court invalidating the Colorado ballot initiative. Suzanne B. Goldberg, an attorney involved in the case from the beginning on behalf of the Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund, and Lisa Keen, a journalist who covered the initiative campaign and litigation, tell the story of the case, providing an inside view of this complex and important litigation. For readers concerned with contemporary legal issues, politics, or civil rights, Strangers to the Law is a valuable primer for understanding the gay civil rights movement todayincluding the similarities to other movements, the evolution of its visibility and acceptance into the national political landscape, and its dynamic growth under the pressure of political opposition from the religious right. The authors discuss how the emergence of laws seeking to protect gay people from discrimination triggered a political backlash that threatened the strength of civil rights laws protecting all minorities from discrimination. In doing so, Strangers to the Law becomes an important book for readers who have an interest - either personal or political - about gay people in America and their struggle to become part of the nation's body politic. In addition, for those interested in the way litigation is conducted, it is a rich historical account of a prominent case from the very first steps of filing a lawsuit through the trial and appeals and ultimately decision by the United States Supreme Court.