Columbus, Ohio-the case behind the ruling of the Supreme Court of the United States that legalizes same-sex marriage throughout the country is known as Obergefell v. Hodges, but Ohio’s two men whose names became that title, they would not disagree as they would seem, and now they are friends.
A year after the decision of June 26, 2015, the main plaintiff, Jim Obergefell, was in an event for a LGBTQ defense organization when his former director asked him if he wanted to meet Rick Hodges, who had been the title demanded as director of state health in Ohio, one of the states challenged for not allowing the same sex couplations to go to Marry.
“I don’t know, you tell me. Do I want to meet Rick Hodges?” Obergefell remembers responding.
The two met to have coffee at a hotel and got along.
Hodges said he wanted to meet Obergefell because it is an “icon.” He said he remembers telling Obergefell something like: “I don’t know if congratulations are in order because this began to lose your husband, but I’m glad you won and I have never been so happy to lose in my life.”
Obergefell and John Arthur, who brought initial legal action, were lifelong partners who lived in Cincinnati. After Arthur was diagnosed with ALS, or the amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, in 2011, Obergefell became the arthur caregiver when the incurable condition devastated his health. They flew to Maryland to marry before Arthur died in 2013, and the legal battle began when they knew that their union would not be listed in the death certificate managed by the Ohio Department of Health.
Although the role of Hodges as Health Director demanded that he defend the State, it did not mean that their personal opinions were aligned with the position of the State.
“Personally, I supported their efforts, like some of the people who worked in the case of the State. He had a job to do and I did the best I can,” Hodges said.
In the months prior to the Court’s decision, Hodges had brought together a group of lawyers from Ohio to develop the paperwork necessary to create the licensed system so that the judges grant the marriage licenses of same -sex couples on the day of the decision if the Supreme Court ruled in his favor, said Obergefell’s main lawyer in the case, Al Gerhardstein.
Gerhardstein said that Obergefell’s friendship and Hodge is unusual in a “very positive and exemplary way.”
“We need more models like that while we fight with difficult social problems,” he said.
The duo said that they see each other two or three times a year and that they have routinely spoken together in conferences and panels.
“It’s fun, every time we enter an event together, everyone applauds for him and look at me as if I were the prince of darkness until we finish, and then it’s great,” Hodges said.
They are seeing more often this year, since it is the tenth anniversary of the decision. Recently, they saw themselves in a symposium at the University of Northern Kentucky and in another event, sponsored by Equality Ohio, the same organization that led to its introduction for the first time.
“I can’t think of other cases that the plaintiff and the defendant are friends. They can exist, I don’t know about them,” Obergefell said. “But I am very happy that Rick and I are friends.”
