David Coffman, a local tax attorney known for representing gay-right causes, has captured the attention of the national gay-marriage movement. He applied for a marriage license in the King County Courthouse earlier this month with his boyfriend. Promptly denied, he is now drafting a lawsuit that he plans to file in federal court—eventually trying to take his case to the Supreme Court. From this week's issue:

Coffman's plan is exactly the kind of thing that LGBT legal groups have been working for years to prevent—and for good reason. Coffman's crusade could sacrifice a generation of gay-rights progress if the Supreme Court finds that separate (civil unions) is equal (to marriage). It's happened before. In 1896, the court found in the landmark case Plessy v. Ferguson that separate railcars for African Americans constituted equal treatment under the law, a decision that the court didn't reverse for almost 60 years. Fearing just this kind of scenario, groups such as Lambda Legal and the American Civil Liberties Union have instead litigated for gay marriage in a carefully orchestrated state-by-state strategy, identifying states with progressive courts and winning marriage rights in places such as Massachusetts (2005), California (2008), and Iowa (2009). Last year, and again in May, a coalition of national nonprofits issued a notice warning attorneys and gay couples that "pushing the federal government... or suing in states where the courts aren't ready is likely to lead to bad rulings."

But there is some method to his madness. Read the full story.