On June 26, 2015, a 5-4 Supreme Court ruling made same-sex marriage legal in every state. The lead plaintiff was an Ohio man named Jim Obergefell. His husband had died of ALS the year before, and Ohio refused to list him as the surviving spouse. Here is the full story of how Obergefell v. Hodges happened, what the decision actually says, and why it still matters in 2026.
The short version
- Obergefell v. Hodges held that every state must license marriages between same-sex couples and recognize those performed elsewhere.
- Jim Obergefell's case began after Ohio refused to list him as the surviving spouse on John Arthur's death certificate.
- The 5-4 ruling relied on the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment.
- The 2022 Respect for Marriage Act adds statutory recognition protections, but it does not replace Obergefell's requirement that states issue licenses.
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$12.00Who Was Jim Obergefell
Jim Obergefell met John Arthur in Cincinnati in the early 1990s. They stayed together for twenty years. In 2011, John was diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. By 2013, he was on hospice and could not stand or breathe without help.
That June, the Supreme Court struck down part of the federal Defense of Marriage Act in United States v. Windsor. Jim watched the ruling from John's hospital bed. He turned to him and proposed.
Ohio did not allow same-sex marriage. So a friend chartered a medical jet, flew the couple to Maryland (which did recognize same-sex marriage), and they were married on the tarmac at Baltimore-Washington airport. John was on a stretcher. The ceremony took seven minutes.
Three months later, John died. The Ohio Department of Health refused to list Jim on his husband's death certificate. The state insisted John had died unmarried.
A dispute over one death certificate became a constitutional case affecting marriage law in every state.
That blank line on a piece of paper became the case that changed American marriage law. Jim sued Ohio's director of health, Richard Hodges. The case picked up four other couples and two widowers along the way. It arrived at the Supreme Court in early 2015 under the name Obergefell v. Hodges.
The Case at a Glance
| Decided | June 26, 2015 |
| Vote | 5 to 4 |
| Majority opinion | Justice Anthony Kennedy |
| Dissents | Roberts, Scalia, Thomas, Alito (each wrote their own) |
| Plaintiffs | 14 same-sex couples and 2 widowers from 4 states |
| Result | Same-sex marriage legal nationwide under 14th Amendment |
How the Case Got to the Supreme Court
Obergefell was not one case. It was four lawsuits consolidated into one: Obergefell from Ohio, Tanco from Tennessee, DeBoer from Michigan, and Bourke from Kentucky. Each one asked the federal courts a version of the same question. Does the 14th Amendment force states to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, and to recognize same-sex marriages performed in other states?
Lower courts had been splitting on this for years. By late 2014, every federal appeals court that had ruled had said yes, the 14th Amendment requires it. Then the Sixth Circuit said no.
That circuit split is what forced the Supreme Court to take the case. When federal appellate courts disagree on a constitutional question, the country ends up with different rules in different states. The Court accepts a case to settle it.
The Sixth Circuit covered Ohio, Michigan, Kentucky, and Tennessee. Its November 2014 ruling was the one the plaintiffs appealed. So when SCOTUS granted certiorari in January 2015, the cases from those four states became Obergefell v. Hodges.
The Oral Arguments
The Court heard arguments on April 28, 2015. The full session ran two and a half hours. Two questions were on the table.
Question one: does the 14th Amendment require a state to license a marriage between two people of the same sex? Question two: does the 14th Amendment require a state to recognize a same-sex marriage performed and licensed in another state where it is legal?
Justice Kennedy was the swing vote. He had written the three previous landmark LGBTQ+ rulings: Romer v. Evans in 1996, Lawrence v. Texas in 2003, and the Windsor decision in 2013. The plaintiffs' attorneys directed much of their argument at him. Justice Scalia and Justice Alito pushed back hard on whether the Court had any business changing a definition of marriage that had stood for thousands of years. The state attorneys leaned on that argument.
Mary Bonauto argued for the couples on question one. She is a longtime civil rights lawyer who had won the first state-level marriage case in Massachusetts back in 2003. Douglas Hallward-Driemeier argued question two. Solicitor General Donald Verrilli argued for the United States as friend of the court, supporting the couples.
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The Decision: June 26, 2015
The opinion came down at 10:00 a.m. on a Friday. Kennedy wrote for the majority. Chief Justice Roberts read his dissent from the bench, the first time he had done so.
The vote was 5-4. Kennedy was joined by Justices Ginsburg, Breyer, Sotomayor, and Kagan. Roberts, Scalia, Thomas, and Alito each filed separate dissents.
Kennedy's opinion grounded the ruling in two clauses of the 14th Amendment: the Due Process Clause and the Equal Protection Clause. The Due Process Clause protects "fundamental liberties" the government cannot take away. The Equal Protection Clause says no state can "deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."
The opinion identified four principles for why the right to marry is fundamental and applies equally to same-sex couples:
| 1 | Personal choice in marriage is part of individual autonomy. Marriage is one of the most intimate decisions a person makes. The Constitution protects that choice. |
| 2 | Marriage supports a two-person union unlike any other. It offers companionship, security, and recognition that the Court called "essential to our most profound hopes and aspirations." |
| 3 | Marriage safeguards children and families. Hundreds of thousands of children were already being raised by same-sex couples. Denying marriage harmed those children with no offsetting benefit. |
| 4 | Marriage is a keystone of the social order. Excluding same-sex couples from marriage stamped them as inferior and locked them out of more than a thousand federal benefits tied to marriage. |
The opinion ends with one of the most quoted paragraphs in modern American law. Kennedy wrote that the plaintiffs were not asking to disrespect marriage but to be included in it. Their hope, he said, was "not to be condemned to live in loneliness, excluded from one of civilization's oldest institutions. They ask for equal dignity in the eyes of the law. The Constitution grants them that right."
The Court's 2015 decision applied the constitutional right to civil marriage across all fifty states.
The Dissents
All four conservative justices wrote separately. Each made a different version of the same argument: the Court was overstepping by deciding a question that should be left to state legislatures and voters.
Chief Justice Roberts focused on judicial restraint. He wrote that the majority had "no basis in the Constitution or this Court's precedent" for finding a fundamental right to same-sex marriage. Most pointedly, he warned that the decision would "stigmatize" Americans who disagreed.
Justice Scalia called the opinion "a judicial Putsch" and described Kennedy's writing as "pretentious" and "egotistic." Justice Thomas argued the majority's understanding of "liberty" was a modern invention. Justice Alito predicted the ruling would be "used to vilify Americans who are unwilling to assent to the new orthodoxy."
The dissents matter because they have been quoted ever since by lawmakers and legal commentators trying to narrow or overturn the decision. The 2022 Dobbs opinion that overturned Roe v. Wade included a concurrence from Justice Thomas calling for Obergefell to be reconsidered too.
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71% Of Americans supported same-sex marriage when Gallup last polled in 2023, up from 27% when polling on the question began in 1996. |
What Changed That Friday
Within hours of the ruling, same-sex couples were getting marriage licenses in states that had banned the unions that morning. The White House lit its north portico in rainbow colors that night. Photos of the building bathed in red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple ran on every front page the next day.
The practical changes for couples were significant and immediate. Social Security spousal benefits became available. Federal tax filing as a married couple opened up. Hospital visitation rights, inheritance protections, adoption pathways, and parental presumption laws shifted overnight in 13 states where same-sex marriage had still been illegal.
For Jim Obergefell, the win was personal. Ohio amended John Arthur's death certificate to list him as the surviving spouse. The blank line was filled in.
Why Obergefell Still Matters in 2026
Marriage equality remains the law of the land more than eleven years after the decision. The U.S. Census Bureau's 2024 American Community Survey estimates count roughly 836,000 married same-sex couple households.
But the ground is not permanently settled. Justice Thomas's 2022 concurrence in Dobbs explicitly named Obergefell as a precedent that should be reconsidered. A future case could test whether a majority would preserve the ruling.
Congress passed the Respect for Marriage Act in 2022 as a backstop. Both layers of protection remain in place: federal law requires recognition of valid marriages, while the constitutional ruling requires states to issue licenses.
Frequently Asked Questions
What does Obergefell v. Hodges mean in plain English?
The Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that the U.S. Constitution requires every state to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples and to recognize same-sex marriages performed in other states. After the ruling, gay marriage became legal in all 50 states on the same day.
Who was Jim Obergefell?
Jim Obergefell is an Ohio man who sued the state in 2013 after Ohio refused to list him as the surviving spouse on his late husband John Arthur's death certificate. His name became the lead plaintiff name when several similar cases were consolidated. He is now a civil rights advocate.
When was same-sex marriage legalized in the United States?
Federally, June 26, 2015. That was the day the Supreme Court decided Obergefell v. Hodges. Some states had legalized it earlier on their own. Massachusetts was first in 2004. Twelve more states and Washington D.C. had followed before the Obergefell ruling forced the remaining 13 states.
Can Obergefell be overturned?
In theory, yes. Justice Thomas's 2022 concurrence in Dobbs argued the Court should reconsider Obergefell. A new case would need to reach the Supreme Court, and a majority of justices would have to vote to reverse. The Respect for Marriage Act of 2022 provides a federal-law backstop that would survive even if the constitutional ruling were overturned.
What is the difference between Obergefell and the Respect for Marriage Act?
Obergefell is a Supreme Court decision based on the 14th Amendment. It requires states to license and recognize same-sex marriages. The Respect for Marriage Act is a 2022 federal statute. It requires the federal government and states to recognize valid same-sex and interracial marriages from any state, but does not require states to issue licenses. Both protections currently exist.
How many same-sex married couples are there in the U.S.?
The U.S. Census Bureau's 2024 American Community Survey estimates count roughly 836,000 married same-sex couple households in the United States.
For another federal policy chapter, read about Don't Ask Don't Tell, the 18-year military ban that forced LGBTQ+ servicemembers to lie about who they were until its 2011 repeal.
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Mark Pride Month with a Flag That Carries the Story Eleven years since Obergefell. Hundreds of years before it. The flags below carry that history into your home, office, or front porch. |
