Baker vs. Nelson

Jack Baker and Michael McConnell were introduced by a mutual friend in 1966. In 1969, Baker enrolled in law school at the University of Minnesota and became active in Fight Repression of Erotic Expression (FREE), the University's LGBTQ+ student group, soon elected as president. 

While doing research during his first semester, he discovered that the Minnesota marriage statutes did not mention gender, and therefore did not explicitly prohibit same-sex marriage. Baker leveraged FREE to elevate the issue of gay marriage.

When Jack Baker and Michael McConnell became the first same-sex couple in the United States to apply for a marriage license, in 1970, Hennepin County clerk Gerald Nelson rejected their application. They then sued Nelson, claiming a constitutional right to marry in what would become a landmark Supreme Court Case.

Over the course of 1971, Baker's case would move from the District Court to the Minnesota Supreme Court, with a later appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, asking them to rule on the issue of same-sex marriage for the first time.

The Supreme Court dismissed the case in 1972.

Jack Baker and Michael McConnell later moved to Blue Earth County, Minnesota, where they would again apply for a marriage license. This time, McConnell went to the courthouse alone. The clerk asked no questions about the gender of his intended and issued the license in 1971.