Is Marriage Dead?

Richard Nixon is justly famous for opening up China, covering up Watergate, vetoing a comprehensive child care act, and passing some of the most protective environmental legislation in our nation's history. But until I read Stephanie Coontz's engaging and provocative history of marriage, I did not recall that he had predicted—as early as 1970—that we would have to wait until 2000 before gay marriage would be acceptable to the American people.