Earlier this week, the Supreme Court heard arguments for two landmark gay rights cases — California's Proposition 8 and the federal Defense of Marriage Act.
The cases came amid a huge surge in public support for gay marriage over the past decade.
But this is just the latest fight in a near 40-year battle fought by LGBT Americans to gain recognition and rights. Here's the timeline of how that successful journey progressed.
The Gay Rights movement burst onto the public scene with the 1969 Stonewall Riots in New York City, but the groundwork existed even before that. Here are demonstrators protesting in front of Philadelphia's Independence Hall on July 4, 1967.
Source: Infoplease, AP
This demonstration took place a week before the first Christopher Street Day, the commemoration of the Stonewall Riots. The riots — which took place on June 28, 1969 — were a retaliation by members of the gay community following a police raid on the Stonewall Inn, a bar in Greenwich Village.
Source: Infoplease, AP
Throughout the early 1970s, the gay rights movement expanded, specifically in New York and San Francisco. In 1973, the American Psychiatric Association removed homosexuality from their definitive list of mental illnesses.
Source: Infoplease, AP
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