On November 4, 2008, California voters adopted the highly controversial Proposition 8, a ballot initiative banning same-sex marriage by amending the state constitution to provide that 'only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California.' Supported by $40 million in financial backing from religious and other groups hostile to marriage equality, its proponents argued that if the measure wasn't adopted, public schools would soon be teaching children 'that gay marriage is okay.' The passage of Proposition 8 put the state's gay and lesbian citizens, their relationships, and their children in a second-class, inferior, and less-respected status.
Shocked by the results of the vote, supporters of marriage equality prepared to challenge Proposition 8 as a violation of the constitutional rights of gays and lesbians enlisting two of the nation's preeminent lawyers: David Boies and Theodore B. Olson. At first glance, they seemed unlikely allies, having argued against each other in the landmark Bush v. Gore case, which effectively decided the 2000 presidential election. But the two men had since become close friends and, dedicated to American principles of equality, due process, and the rule of law, they joined forces to bring one of the key civil liberties cases of our time.
Redeeming the Dream is the remarkable story of the five-year struggle to win the right for gays and lesbians to marry in California, from the development of the strategies to challenge Proposition 8, to its being declared unconstitutional in federal district court by Chief Judge Vaughn R. Walker, to ultimate success in the Supreme Court of the United States on June 26, 2013. Boies and Olson guide readers through all the key legal issues framing the fight, the behind-the-scenes planning of what they recognized from the outset as a landmark case, and the human values that were at the heart of their battle to put state-sanctioned discrimination on trial.
Redeeming the Dream is the authoritative, dramatic, and inspiring up-close account of the most important civil rights case since Brown v. Board of Education and Loving v. Virginia, and a riveting story of law, justice, and above all else, love.
