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Paula Martinac is the author of three novels, includingiOut of Time,/iwhich won the Lambda Award for Lesbian Fiction. She is also the author ofiThe Queerest Places: A National Guide to Gay and Lesbian Historic Sites./i She lives in New York City with her life partner, Katie Hogan.brbrRoberta Achtenberg, former Assistant Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, was the highest-ranking openly gay official in the Clinton administration.bIntroduction: The Reality of Lesbian and Gay Love and Marriage/bbrbrUnless you've been hibernating, with no access to the mass media, it's been almost impossible to avoid the topic of legalizing lesbian and gay marriage. It doesn't matter if you're gay or straight--you've most likely had to think about the potentiality of same-sex marriage and exactly where you stand on this issue. And if you live in Hawaii, you're actually living and breathing it, with headlines in the local papers almost every day about the pending court decision that would permit same-sex couples to legally marry.brbrThe debate engendered by the litigation brought in Hawaii by three same-sex couples who applied and were rejected for marriage licenses has been enormous. It's not only been the focus of media attention, it's been discussed and fought over in almost every state legislature across the country and in the U.S. Congress. Lawsuits have also been brought in the states of Vermont and New York by same-sex couples seeking the right to marry legally.brbrThere are a number of intriguing legal questions raised by this historic civil rights struggle. Will same-sex couples win the right to marry in Hawaii? In all probability, according to Evan Wolfson, director of the Marriage Project at Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund, a national nonprofit law firm that works for lesbian and gay civil rights. Will couples go to Hawaii, marry, and t?Ð