Claiming the Title: Gay Olympics on Trial

In 1982, a San Francisco athletic group tries to hold a 'Gay Olympics,' instigating what will ultimately become a battle at the U.S. Supreme Court and a challenge over the place of gays and lesbians in American society. The Supreme Court is widely viewed as the country's chief defender of civil rights. Yet its long-hidden struggle with demands for gay equality points to a more complicated reality. The inner workings of the Court are exposed, revealing an institution and individual justices - real people with human emotions and deeply felt assumptions - divided and in conflict. Former Olympian Dr. Tom Waddell founds the Gay Olympic Games, an international sporting event meant to nurture a healthy self-image for gays and lesbians while publicly affirming positive examples of homosexuality. The U.S. Olympic Committee, however, doesn't want the words 'gay' and 'Olympics' combined. Despite a long history of disparate groups adopting the Olympic name - from Special Olympics and Police Olympics to the Xerox Olympics, Crab Cooking Olympics and even the Rat Olympics - the USOC sues to stop the event. The gay group, led by attorney Mary Dunlap, fights through losses at every level of the judiciary until turning to the high court is the last option. Their pursuit turns out to be the opening salvo in the next decade's major gay rights battles at the Supreme Court - and a preview of a conflict that continues to split society to this day.