2003—By a vote of 4 to 3, the Massachusetts supreme court (in Goodridge v. Department of Public Health) imposes same-sex marriage on the benighted citizens of Massachusetts, as the court rules that a state statute defining marriage as the legal union of a man and a woman—a statutory definition that dates back to colonial times and that is derived from English common law—somehow violates the “individual liberty and equality safeguards” of the state constitution.  The majority opinion by chief justice Margaret H. Marshall, wife of former New York Times columnist Anthony Lewis, is widely credited with helping to secure President George W. Bush’s re-election in 2004.