Baker v. Nelson
Minnesota supreme court case regarding same-sex marriage
Richard John Baker v. Gerald R. Nelson, 291 Minn. 310, 191 N.W.2d 185 (1971), was a case in which the Minnesota Supreme Court decided that construing a marriage statute to restrict marriage licenses to persons of the opposite sex "does not offend" the United States Constitution. Baker appealed the decision, and on October 10, 1972, the U.S. Supreme Court dismissed the appeal "for want of a substantial federal question".
Because the case came to the Supreme Court through mandatory appellate review (not certiorari), the dismissal constituted a decision on the merits and established Baker v. Nelson as precedent, although the extent of its precedential effect had been subject to debate. In May 2013, Minnesota legalized same-sex marriage and it took effect on August 1, 2013. On June 26, 2015, the Supreme Court explicitly overruled Baker in Obergefell v. Hodges.
Facts and trial
On 18 May 1970, activists James Michael McConnell, librarian, and Richard John Baker, law student on the Minneapolis campus of the University of Minnesota, applied for a marriage license in Minneapolis.
“Baker v. Nelson” enters the record as minnesota supreme court case regarding same-sex marriage. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Baker, Nelson and Minnesota can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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