July 1st, 2025 marks the 25th anniversary of civil unions in Vermont. This legal alternative to marriage was the first of its kind in the United States.

In the Vermont Supreme Court case Baker v. Vermont, the court ruled that the state had no legal basis to discriminate against same-sex couples. If the legislature would not allow same-sex couples to get marriage licenses, lawmakers would have to figure out a legal alternative. The result: civil unions.

Stan Baker was the lead plaintiff on that case, alongside with his partner, Peter Harrigan, and two other couples. He died on Monday at the age of 79. We'll listen back to a 2019 interview he gave on Vermont Edition, and hear from Susan Murray of Burlington. She was one of the attorneys who represented Baker and the other plaintiffs in the lawsuit.

Vermont Edition producer Andrea Laurion spoke with LGBTQ+ Vermonters who were coming of age — and coming out — when civil unions became legal. They were likely too young at the time to be thinking about marriage for themselves, but old enough to know what was going on and how it might affect them one day.

We also talk with David Moats, who won a Pulitzer Prize in 2001 for his editorials about civil unions in the Rutland Herald.

The 25th anniversary of civil unions in Vermont