President Obama Congratulates Lambda Legal: VIDEO

Yesterday, Ari noted that Mayor Bloomberg had declared yesterday 'Lambda Legal Day' in NYC. President Obama also had some kind words for the country's oldest and arguably most important LGBT legal services organization, and related them in a special video. Lambda Legal is celebrating its 40th anniversary this year.

Watch, AFTER THE JUMP...

Today Is Lambda Legal Day in New York City

By ARI EZRA WALDMAN

Lambda Legal, the country's oldest and arguably most important legal services organization dedicated to protecting the rights of the LGBT community, is celebrating its 40th anniversary this year. It began as a small operation, evoking a David-versus-Goliath motif. It's first client was itself. Its second major victory changed the way we think about free speech. Its most famous case brought gay people out from the shadows. And through countless legal, educational, and political efforts over forty years, Lambda has done more for the gay community than any one person could adequately appreciate or explain. 

Because of Lambda's incomparable accomplishments, New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg has declared today, May 6, 2013, "Lambda Legal Day." I'd like to make sure we all understand why.

Without Lambda Legal, we wouldn't be where we are today: celebrating the freedom to marry in New England, permitted to express and embrace our sexuality in schools and elsewhere, arguing marriage and the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) at the Supreme Court, and expecting victories in state legislatures across the country, to name just a few our remarkable successes. We used to be hidden in underground bars with darkened windows, subject to random and pernicious police raids, and forced deep into the closet and far toward the margins of legitimate society. Today, for the most part, we aren't.

To some of us, names like Bill Thom, James Dale, John Lawrence, Ninia Baehr, and Karen Golinski evoke feelings of heroism and shared sacrifice. They all were plaintiffs in important gay rights cases in the last forty years and they were all represented by Lambda Legal.

AFTER THE JUMP, I offer a taste of some of Lambda's most notable accomplishments. If you're interested in learning more, I encourage you to check out the organization's website, contact their staff, and see how you can help.

LGBT Legal Eagles Jon Davidson and Jennifer Pizer Await DOMA Case Outside SCOTUS: PHOTO

Here's Lambda Legal Legal Director Jon Davidson and National Marriage Project Director Jennifer Pizer in line outside the Supreme Court this morning, awaiting entrance for the consideration of the Edie Windsor DOMA case.

Davidson reports on Twitter: "Smaller crowds today, but those present clearly are aware of how momentous the case being heard shortly is. Can the federal government disregard some couples' marriages? How should courts judge constitutionality of laws that discriminate based on sexual orientation? Weighty issues indeed...Waiting in line for hours gives me a whole new appreciation of the legal question of 'standing.'"

Said Pizer: "Pizer: No protesters yet. It's a lot calmer."

WATCH LIVE: Lambda Legal's Iowa Town Hall on Why Marriage Matters with Special Guest Zach Wahls

Lambda Legal is holding a virtual town hall at 1 pm ET at Drake University. The event, which features Sharon Malheiro, Founder and Board Chair, One Iowa, Jim Bennett, Midwest Regional Director, Lambda Legal, Donna Red Wing, Executive Director, One Iowa, and special guest Zach Wahls, is streaming live online.

Watch it, AFTER THE JUMP...

In 2009, the Iowa Supreme Court issued a unanimous decision in Lambda Legal’s lawsuit Varnum v. Brien striking down Iowa’s marriage ban and extending the freedom to marry to gay and lesbian couples. Since then, gay and lesbian couples in Iowa have been able to legally wed.

In response, well-funded antigay groups launched an outright attack on Iowa’s courts and the freedom to marry, resulting in the ousting of three well-respected Iowa Supreme Court justices during a retention election. This mean-spirited campaign was designed to intimidate judges in Iowa and across the nation and fuel a fundamental misunderstanding of the role of the judiciary in our democracy.

Why Is This DOMA Case Different From All Others?

BY ARI EZRA WALDMAN

Three cases. Three courts. One result.

Whether it was Judge Jeffrey White of the Northern District of California, Judge Barbara Jones of the Southern District of New York, or Judge Joseph Tauro of the District of Massachusetts (or, of course, a unanimous three-judge panel of the First Circuit Court of Appeal), the result was essentially the same: the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) is unconstitutional.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) has asked the Supreme Court to hear the DOMA cases out of the First Circuit and the Northern District of California, bypassing the Ninth Circuit. Earlier this week, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), which represents Edith Windsor (right) in the New York case, asked the Supreme Court to bypass the Second Circuit and take Ms. Windsor's case, as well. Skipping over the intermediate appellate courts is rare, but not impossible, especially when the case is so obviously headed for an ultimate decision at One First Street.

Still, each of these cases -- Golinski v. Office of Personnel Management, Massachusetts v. Department of Health and Human Services, and Windsor v. United States -- is slightly different. In Golinski, the court preferred to use heightened scrutiny to invalidate DOMA; in Massachusetts, the First Circuit used so-called "rational basis plus," or a more searching form of rational basis review; and, in Windsor, the court rejected DOMA under simple rational basis. A win is a win when it comes to equality and access to the federal marriage benefits, but a Supreme Court decision to hear Windsor, in particular, could bring the scrutiny issue front and center.

In the end, while DOMA will likely die at the Supreme Court next term, the level of scrutiny for sexual orientation discrimination will probably continue its muddled trajectory.

Legalizing Gay: The Child Plaintiffs

BY ARI EZRA WALDMAN

To celebrate Pride 2012 and to honor the great civil rights and political successes we have earned recently, I would like to offer a series of columns on the lawyers, advocates, scholars, and individual leaders who have sacrificed so much, developed novel legal arguments, and won the legal victories upon which we stand today. It is impossible to include everyone; a entire life's work would fail to honor all of our forefathers. But these few representatives symbolize the contributions of the greater whole: a group of men and women, young and old, who have sacrificed so that we can live a life of freedom today. Today, the child plaintiffs.

Aaron Fricke and Jamie Nabozny came out before most of us did, became standard bearers of LGBT honor and equality, faced burdens that no one should, and sacrificed childhood frivolity for a witness chair. They are the boys who would be men, the children who took on adult responsibility to fight back against unparalleled brutality and anti-gay censorship, respectively. And, while LGBT youth are still being bullied into depression and suicide and while students are still not always given the freedom to engage in affirming, pro-equality speech in schools, Aaron and Jamie deserve our thanks for taking the steps few of their peers would.

Aaron (who wrote a memoir about his experiences using an homage to the classic B-52 song, "Rock Lobster") took his principal to court in 1979 when the administration refused to let him bring a boy as his date to the school prom. In an era of sodomy laws, continued raids on gay establishments, and anti-gay censorship, Aaron accepted oppression no longer.

With the help of the Gay & Lesbian Advocates and Defenders (GLAD), Aaron challenged the public school's refusal to allow him to attend prom with a same-sex date on free speech grounds and won (Fricke v. Lynch (D.R.I. 1980)).

Jamie also won his case, but his story is nothing if not tragic.

Throughout middle school and high school, Jamie was subjected to endless anti-gay verbal and physical abuse by fellow students at his public high school in Ashland, Wisconsin. His tormentors urinated on him, performed a mock rape on him during class and in front of an approving teacher, and attacked him so brutally one morning that he required hospitalization. School officials new about all of this, yet refused to do much of anything; at one point, Jamie's principal said that Jamie should "man up" and that Jamie should expect the abuse because of his sexual orientation. Jamie attempted suicide three times, dropped out of school, and escaped his abuse by going to live with a relative in another state.

The documentary Bullied is about Jamie's case. He sued his Ashland, Wisconsin school, claiming it was a violation of his civil rights for school officials to willfully ignore his plight. He lost at the district court level, but thanks to Lambda Legal, Jamie won a precedent-setting victory at the Seventh Circuit and a nearly $1 million settlement (Nabozny v. Podlesny (7th Cir. 1996)).

Aaron's and Jamie's cases are quite different: Aaron's principal, though closed-minded, never condoned nor actively supported violence against Aaron, whereas Jamie's principal and teachers did. However, by refusing to permit Aaron to express his identity, Aaron's principal validated Jamie's tormentors and their conduct. Both villains felt there was something wrong with being gay and something worse about expressing it. Aaron and Jamie refused to accept this hatred, and every proud out gay teen relies on the legal precedents set by Aaron, Jamie, and their lawyers.

CONTINUED, AFTER THE JUMP...