Formation 1978 Region served New England Founded 1978 | Purpose LGBT rights Website www.glad.org | |
Headquarters Boston, Massachusetts, United States Similar National Center for Lesbian, Massachusetts Transgender Political, Freedom to Marry, Family Equality Council, Transgender Law Center | ||
Glad now stands for glbtq legal advocates defenders
GLBTQ Legal Advocates & Defenders (GLAD) is a non-profit legal rights organization in the United States. The organization works to end discrimination based on sexual orientation, HIV status, and gender identity and expression. The organization primarily achieves this goal through litigation, advocacy, and education work in all areas of LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender) rights and the rights of people living with HIV. In addition, GLAD operates a legal information line, GLAD Answers, where LGBTQ & HIV+ residents of New England can receive attorney referrals and information about their rights. The organization changed its name to GLBTQ Legal Advocates & Defenders in February 2016.
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Background
GLAD is based in Boston, Massachusetts, and serves the New England area of the United States. John Ward founded GLAD in 1978 in response to a sting operation conducted by Boston police that resulted in the arrest of more than a hundred men in the men's rooms of the main building of the Boston Public Library. GLAD filed its first case, Doe v. McNiff, that same year and eventually all those arrested were either found not guilty or had the charges against them dismissed. An early victory came in Fricke v. Lynch (1980), in which GLAD represented Aaron Fricke, an 18-year-old student at Cumberland High School in Rhode Island, who won the right to bring a same-sex date to a high school dance.
Notable cases
Work on marriage equality
In 1997, GLAD, along with Beth Robinson and Susan Murray filed a lawsuit, Baker v. Vermont on behalf of three Vermont couples seeking the right to marry. On December 20, 1999 The Vermont Supreme Court ruled that same-sex couples must be granted the same legal benefits, protections, and obligations as marriage under Vermont law. As a direct result of this decision in 2000 Vermont became the first state to allow same-sex couples to enter a legal relationship equal to marriage, known in Vermont as a civil union.
In 2003, GLAD received national attention for its work in winning marriage rights for same-sex couples in Massachusetts. In Goodridge v. Department of Public Health, it successfully argued before the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court that to restrict marriage to heterosexual couples was a violation of the state constitution. In October 2008, GLAD won marriage rights for same-sex couples in Connecticut with a decision of the Supreme Court of Connecticut in Kerrigan v. Commissioner of Public Health.
On November 18, 2008, the fifth anniversary of Goodridge, GLAD, working with other statewide groups, launched a project called the "Six by Twelve" campaign that aimed to bring same-sex marriage to all six New England states by 2012. The campaign aimed to make New England a "marriage equality zone." The campaign worked primarily through state legislatures and hoped to provide a road map for the rest of the country in 2012. Within six months, same-sex marriage laws were passed in three more states, but the Maine law was repealed by the voters on November 3, 2009. After this decision by the voters, along with a coalition of other civil rights groups, GLAD proceeded with a two-year public education campaign in Maine. On June 30, 2011, EqualityMaine and GLAD announced plans to place a voter initiative in support of same-sex marriage on Maine's November 2012 ballot. The voter initiative passed, making Maine the first state to legalize same sex marriage through a ballot vote. On May 2, 2013 the “Six by Twelve” campaign came to a close when Rhode Island’s legislature passed a bill allowing same-sex couples to marry and Governor Lincoln Chafee signed it into law.
When it filed Gill v. Office of Personnel Management in March 2009, GLAD became the first organization to file a federal court challenge to Section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) that prevented the federal government from recognizing the validity of same-sex marriages. On November 9, 2010, GLAD filed a second challenge to Section 3 with Pedersen v. Office of Personnel Management. It won both cases in U.S. District Court and in the First and Second Circuit Courts of Appeals, respectively. In July and August 2012, the U.S. Department of Justice filed certiorari petitions in the U.S. Supreme Court in both those cases. The Supreme Court chose instead to review Windsor v. United States.