Progressive Stepping-Stones for Civil Rights

As we near the 800th anniversary of the original declaration for freedom and rights, The Magna Carta, the President of the United States of America made a stand today. For the first time, Barack Obama gave his official stance on ‘same sex marriage.’ Hopping across the stepping-stones across the oppressive lake of despair, starting with the Magna Carta in 1215, humankind is continually trying to make the world a more acceptable society. As you journey on the trail to civil liberties, starting with the Magna Carta, then follow the path to the Mayflower Compact, Fundamental Orders of Connecticut, Declaration of Rights and Grievances, Virginia Declaration of Rights, Declaration of Independence, Articles of Confederation, The Constitution of the United States, South Carolina Exposition and Protest, Texas Declaration of Independence, Emancipation Proclamation, and The Civil Rights Bill of 1968, Americans have slowly focused more and more on individuals and less on the group as a whole. When people initially fought for rights, it was from unjust tyranny. Now a days, people are fighting for individual rights for every person, for every civil liberty.

Starting in 2003 with Lawrence v. Texas, which allowed sexual acts to take place between same-sex individuals, to Goodridge v. Department of Public Health in 2004, which marked the first time an US court would acknowledge a same-sex marriage as constitutional, to the 2009 Matthew Shepard Act, which makes hate acts towards homosexuals punishable by federal law, Obama has just laid down the next big stepping stone. The LGBT community has received the official work straight from the president’s mouth. Obama has, on national television, “affirmed, that I think that same-sex couples should be able to get married.” This will no doubt help push the states that have not already allowed same-sex marriage to do so.