# Baehr v. Lewin (1993) Decided **May 5, 1993**, 3–1 by the **Hawaii Supreme Court**. The court ruled that the state's refusal to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples constituted **sex discrimination** under the Hawaii state constitution — and remanded the case to trial court to determine whether the state could justify the discrimination under strict scrutiny. ***Baehr*** is the **first state-supreme-court decision in U.S. history signaling that same-sex couples might have a constitutional right to marry** — and the case that, through Republican congressional reaction, produced the [[Defense of Marriage Act]] three years later. ## What the Court Held Three same-sex couples (Ninia Baehr & Genora Dancel; Tammy Rodrigues & Antoinette Pregil; Pat Lagon & Joseph Melilio) had been denied Hawaii marriage licenses in 1990 and filed suit. The Hawaii Supreme Court did **not** rule that they had a constitutional right to marry. Instead, the court held: - **Hawaii's marriage law discriminated on the basis of sex** — because a woman could marry a man but not a woman, and vice versa - **Under Hawaii's state constitution, sex was a "suspect classification"** requiring strict-scrutiny review - **The state therefore had to demonstrate** at trial that the marriage law served a compelling government interest On remand in 1996, the trial court ruled the state had failed to meet its burden — making Hawaii poised to become the first U.S. state with legal same-sex marriage. The legal pathway was cut off by: - **A 1998 Hawaii constitutional amendment** — voters amended the state constitution to allow the legislature to restrict marriage to opposite-sex couples (passed by 69% of voters) - **The case was rendered moot** by the constitutional amendment; the Hawaii Supreme Court formally dismissed it in December 1999 ## Why Baehr Matters Despite Losing *Baehr* did not produce marriage equality in Hawaii. But it produced the **doctrinal demonstration that marriage equality was constitutionally available** — and triggered the national political response that defined the 1990s. Specifically: - **The Republican congressional response** — federal Republicans drafted what became the [[Defense of Marriage Act]] explicitly to preempt federal recognition of Hawaii same-sex marriages if Hawaii legalized. DOMA passed Congress with overwhelming bipartisan majorities and was signed by President [[Bill Clinton]] in September 1996 - **The state-level anti-marriage-equality response** — between 1996 and 2008, more than 30 states passed constitutional amendments banning same-sex marriage, in direct anticipation of Hawaii's potential legalization. The state-amendment wave became one of the central Republican electoral mobilization tools of the 2000s - **The 12-year doctrinal arc** from *Baehr* (1993) → [[Goodridge v. Department of Public Health]] (Massachusetts, 2003, first U.S. state with legal same-sex marriage) shows the state-court strategy that the LGBTQ legal-rights movement built on ## Place in the Vault *Baehr* is the **opening case** of the modern marriage-equality legal arc. Its political consequences — DOMA, the state-amendment wave, the politicization of marriage as a 2000s wedge issue — define the conditions the [[Queer Liberation Ecosystem]] would spend the next 22 years operating against, until *[[Obergefell v. Hodges]]* in 2015. --- ## See Also - [[Queer Liberation Ecosystem]] - [[Queer Liberation Timeline]] - [[Defense of Marriage Act]] - [[Goodridge v. Department of Public Health]] - [[Obergefell v. Hodges]]