Which was tried first: Goodridge v. Department of Public Health or Dred Scott v. Sandford?
Goodridge v. Department of Public Health Goodridge v. Dept. of Public Health, 798 N.E.2d 941 (Mass. 2003), is a landmark state appellate court case dealing with same-sex marriage in Massachusetts. The November 18, 2003, decision was the first by a U.S. state's highest court to find that same-sex couples had the right to marry. Despite numerous attempts to delay the ruling, and to reverse it, the first marriage licenses were issued to same-sex couples on May 17, 2004, and the ruling has been in full effect since that date.
DeFunis v. Odegaard DeFunis v. Odegaard, 416 U.S. 312 (1974), was a United States Supreme Court case decided on April 23, 1974, that was determined to be moot, and therefore could not go forward. American student Marco DeFunis, who had been denied admission to the University of Washington School of Law in the state of Washington, and then had been provisionally admitted during the pendency of the case, was slated to graduate within a few months at the time the decision was rendered.