American Civil Liberties Union

This was originally posted on The Huffington Post.

As 2012 draws to a close and I reflect on the historic year that was, one of the things that I am most proud of is the role that African Americans played in helping to bring the freedom to marry for committed and loving same-sex couples to my home state of Maryland.

On Friday, the Supreme Court agreed to hear Edie Windsor’s challenge to the discriminatory, so-called Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA).  Despite the fact that Edie and her late spouse, Thea Spyer, were together for more than four decades and were legally married in Canada in 2007, DOMA required the federal government to treat the couple as legal strangers.  When Thea passed away in 2009, Edie was forced to pay more than $363,000 in federal estate taxes that would have otherwise been zero had she been married to a man.

Thanksgiving and the year-end holiday season are right around the corner. During this time of year, families gather to eat together, laugh together and generally celebrate being together.  In the past two years in Florida, those families have included gay men and lesbians who have adopted children and given them loving homes. But it hasn’t always been that way.

For 33 years, Florida law categorically banned gays and lesbians from becoming adoptive parents. As a result, many children who could have been placed in a loving, permanent home were denied that opportunity, spending years in the foster care system and in many cases, aging out without ever being adopted.

With less than a week until Election Day, ACLU affiliates and their coalition partners in states with questions regarding marriage for gay and lesbian couples on the ballot are intensifying their efforts to make history next week. In Maine, Maryland and Washington, voters have the opportunity to expand the freedom to marry to same-sex couples; and Minnesota voters could make that state the first ever to defeat a constitutional amendment defining marriage as between one man and one woman.  Polling data in each of the four states is encouraging, but close. As we near the finish line, thousands of volunteers and coalition staffers are working hard to ensure that all loving, committed couples can marry. Here’s a round up of what’s happening on the ground: