This column was one of the more emotional columns I've written for the Legal Intelligencer. I am writing this sitting in my hotel room at the Dearborn Inn in Michigan, after visiting the Henry Ford Museum of Innovation which houses the historical bus that Rosa Parks rode when she was arrested for violating a Montgomery, Alabama, ordinance requiring her to relinquish her bus seat to a white passenger. Parks' act of defiance sparked one of the largest social movements in history, the Montgomery Bus Boycott, and helped inspire a crusade that led Congress to pass the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which, among other things, bars discrimination on race, color, religion, national origin and sex.

I had the privilege and honor of sitting in that very seat today and was completely overcome with emotion over the courage Parks had then, how far we've come since and, how far we have yet to go in the fight for true equality for all.

As of today, only 22 states and the District of Columbia have express protections for LGBTQ workers based on sexual orientation and gender identity enshrined in law and June 2020, will be one barometer for how far we have to go in the fight for LGBTQ equality as the U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to hear arguments on one of the most unsettled civil rights questions—are LGBTQ people protected by Title VII in the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits employment discrimination based on race, color, religion, national origin and sex?