Former Newton Mayor David Cohen has taken (and earned) his knocks over the years but let’s never forget that the man sure understood the value of community, symbolism, history and was able to rise to the occasion.
One of my favorite David Cohen moments occurred ten years ago today when he invited the city inside his office as he presided over the marriage of Ellen Wade and Maureen Brodoff. Unfortunately the TAB’s extensive coverage of Newton’s historic first gay marriage is no longer online but the Globe has a page one story today about the couple.
The first day that same-sex marriage licenses were issued, they married at Newton City Hall. Ellen wore a robin’s-egg blue silk blouse and pants, Maureen wore black silk. The mayor hosted the ceremony in his office. A rabbi offered a blessing, and a justice of the peace officiated. The pair emerged from the building to the cheers of hundreds. A tiered white wedding cake perched on a table, and balloons fluttered in a rainbow formation tethered to the building columns.
“It was this miracle of a day,” Maureen said.
It was a miracle day. And although I never knew the couple and don’t believe we’ve met since, I’m grateful to Mayor Cohen for recognizing that this was a moment that deserved to be shared by all of us.
No doubt that was an amazing day in Massachusetts, and likely the high point in Mayor Cohen’s tenure. But let’s not be too quick to give him an overabundance of credit. What most people don’t realize [or stop to think about], is that Cohen had the power at his fingertips to change American history, and missed the opportunity.
At any time from the day he took office, Cohen had the authority to instruct the City Clerk to issue marriage licenses to same sex couples, in order to challenge State law. That was exactly what San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom had the courage to do, and as a result he [not Cohen] became a true American hero. Instead, Mayor Cohen waited for the Wade/Brodoff case to work its way to through the court system, and waited again for the court imposed deadline before issuing the first same sex marriage license.
Hard to believe it’s been 10 years. Also hard to believe it’s only been 10 years.
It’s also hard to believe that a solid majority of Americans and maybe even a majority of people here in Massachusetts were opposed to all of this as little as 10 years ago. We do make progress in some areas and when it comes, is often comes with unanticipated swiftness.
I crashed that wedding! What a great day. Then, Massachusetts was the first and only state where same-sex marriage was legal. Today, just 10 years later, there are 17 states and DC that allow it. And the courts are ruling that bans on same sex marriage are unconstitutional in the other 33 where it is illegal. And virtually all of them cite the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts.
According to a photo that I cut out of the Tab back then, John Williams and John ‘Skip’ Smith were the first gay couple married at City Hall by Edward English, justice of the peace.
As a small point of history, the house (c.1868) that they lived in is in line to be demolished as part of the condo project on Court Street. So much for preserving Newton history.
Oregon!
Kind of a disgraceful comment on how off-track this society has become, in so many ways, since drugs hit our brains in the late sixties.