Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) people in the U.S. state of Ohio enjoy most of the same rights as non-LGBTQ people. Same-sex sexual activity has been legal in Ohio since 1974, and same-sex marriage has been legally recognized since June 2015 as a result of Obergefell v. Hodges. Ohio statutes do not address discrimination on account of sexual orientation and gender identity; however, the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in Bostock v. Clayton County established that employment discrimination against LGBTQ people is illegal in 2020. In addition, a number of Ohio cities (including Athens, Columbus, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Dayton and Toledo) have passed anti-discrimination ordinances providing protections in housing and public accommodations. Conversion therapy is also banned in a number of cities. In December 2020, a federal judge invalidated a law banning sex changes on an individual's birth certificate within Ohio.

Recent opinion polls have shown that LGBT rights enjoy popular support in the state. A 2016 Public Religion Research Institute survey showed that 61% of Ohio residents supported same-sex marriage. Another survey by the same pollster in 2019 showed that 71% of respondents favored non-discrimination laws protecting LGBTQ people.

History and legality of same-sex sexual activity As part of the Northwest Territory, Ohio passed the "buggery" law, which provided the death sentence for homosexual sexual activity. In 1804, shortly after statehood, the law was repealed and sodomy was legalized. Despite several court decisions and newspaper articles acknowledging sodomy as legal, the Ohio General Assembly made no effort to overturn these decisions or enact a new law over the following decades. However, the Ohio cities of Cincinnati, Dayton, and Columbus were some of the first to pass laws against "indecent behavior" in 1819, 1842, and 1848 respectively. Cincinnati and Dayton also passed laws in 1849 prohibiting "obscene publications and immoral plays", and Columbus passed a law in 1848 prohibiting men from cross dressing in women's clothing, and vice versa.

Ohio adopted its first sodomy law in 1885, stating that anyone who has "carnal copulation against nature, with another human being or with a beast," is guilty of sodomy, and when convicted, shall be imprisoned in a penitentiary for "not more than twenty years".Brief Amicus Curiae of the Center for the Original Intent of the Constitution in Support of Respondent at A-15, Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558 (2003) (No. 02-102). This was revised to include fellatio (oral sex) in 1889.LGBT America, National Park Service, 19-7. It applied to private, consensual activity as well, and led to police raids on "establishments with a known gay clientele". In April 1886, the Supreme Court of Ohio ruled in Foster et al v. State that sodomy, or "copulation against nature", required the presence of a male, meaning that lesbian sexual activity was exempt from prosecution and thus legal, whereas homosexual and heterosexual sodomy were both punished by up to 20 years' imprisonment.

A 1906 text on state law stated that sodomy could be committed "between two human beings, as between two men, a man and a woman, a man and a boy, a man and a girl, two boys or a boy and a girl where of that age when capable of the crime". Over the following years, numerous court cases dealt with the issue of sodomy, including one in 1915, where a man was sent to the State Reformatory for having engaged in masturbation. In 1929, Ohio law was changed to make sodomy, said to include "any form of unnatural copulation", an offense without possibility of parole. In 1939, the Ohio General Assembly passed a "psychopathic offender" law, under which those convicted of sodomy could be sentenced to life in a mental health institution and were not permitted to be released, even if they were "cured", until the expiration of the minimum term for which, if he or she had been imprisoned, the prisoner would be eligible for parole. An appellate court, ruling in 1944 in State v. Forquer, held that cunnilingus fell out of the sodomy statute's scope. In 1945, State v. Walhenmaier, an Ohio Circuit Court stated that sodomy could be "evidenced by medical examination results".Boyer, "Decoy Enforcement of Homosexual Laws," 278.

A landmark 1957 case (Johnston v. Johnston) resulted in married couples being exempt from prosecution for sodomy: "the private moral relationship between husband and wife are concerned (as to either cunnilingus or fellation [sic],) it is certainly one that rests entirely in the minds of the two of them"; Ohio being the first state in the U.S. to do so. Ohioans were also subscribing to ONE magazine in record numbers, and others were collating in drinking establishments such as lesbian bars. In 1963, Ohio adopted a sex offender registry law, which "disproportionately affected" the LGBTQ community in the state.LGBT America, National Park Service, 19-13. One year prior, police in Mansfield, Ohio had arrested men in a bathroom they "found having sex" and spied on others who "simply stopped to use the restroom" with a hidden camera. The United States Supreme Court declined to hear appeals for sodomy convictions in Mansfield, Ohio in Poyer v. Mayer (1964) and Chamberlain v. Ohio (1966).LGBT America, National Park Service, 19-17, 19-18.

In 1972, Ohio became the eighth state to repeal its sodomy statute.LGBT America, National Park Service, 19-23. Nevertheless, it remained a misdemeanor to express romantic or sexual interest to another person of the same sex, even though Ohio was "one of the earliest states to decriminalize homosexuality". The law was part of a criminal code which was the first in the U.S. to have "gender-neutral sexual assault laws". There were also successful challenges to laws aimed against cross dressing in the state, beginning in the 1970s.LGBT America, National Park Service, 19-24.

The Ohio Supreme Court, in 1974, upheld the refusal of the Ohio Secretary of State, arguing that the promotion of homosexuality as a valid lifestyle is contrary to the public policy of this state", to deny the incorporation of Greater Cincinnati Gay Society for a nonprofit corporation, even though sodomy was no longer illegal. In 1979's State v. Phipps, the Supreme Court of Ohio narrowed the sodomy statute's provision to cover only cases in which the proposition was "unwelcome". In a somewhat related case, in August 1997, Lambda Legal filed a friend-of-the-court legal brief in support of a Jeremy Bird, in Ohio v. Bird, a HIV-positive man "convicted of committing assault with a deadly weapon" after accused of "spitting at a police officer" and spreading HIV. In May 1998, the Ohio Supreme Court affirmed the conviction but did not reach issue on "whether HIV can be transmitted via saliva."

The broad discriminatory nature of the application of Ohio's law was illustrated in State v. Thompson. In 1999, Eric Thompson had made a sexual pass at a jogger and, after the jogger declined, continued on his way. The jogger contacted the police, however, and Thompson was arrested and sentenced to 6 months in jail. In December 2000, the Ohio Eleventh District Court of Appeals reluctantly upheld the trial court decision. In its decision, the Ohio Eleventh rules that it was not clear why the law only applied to "same sex solicitation and not to opposite sex solicitation" and argued it was "inherently inconsistent for the Ohio legislature to now criminalize homosexual solicitation after it has chosen to decriminalize homosexual conduct between consenting adults."

In May 2002, the Supreme Court of Ohio unanimously overturned Thompson's conviction, writing that the law was "facially invalid" under the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution and Section 2, Article I of the Ohio Constitution. As part of a 2003 overhaul to the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Law (SORN), Ohio repealed its anti-gay importuning law. Apart from this case, other litigation which affected LGBTQ people in Ohio included Gajovski v. Gajovski (1991) and Equality Foundation of Greater Cincinnati v. City of Cincinnati (1994). On June 26, 2003, the United States Supreme Court ruled in Lawrence v. Texas to abolish all remaining sodomy laws and statutes nationwide.

Recognition of same-sex relationships

Marriage

In 2003, Representative Bill Seitz introduced the Defense of Marriage Act in the state House of Representatives in 2003. It passed the House by a vote of 73–23 in December 2003 and the Senate in an 18–15 vote in January 2004. It was opposed by eleven Democrats and four Republicans in the Senate. Governor Bob Taft signed the legislation on February 6, 2004. The legislation was enacted in the aftermath of the Goodridge decision on November 18, 2003 in Massachusetts. Ballot Issue 1 of 2004 was a constitutional amendment initiated by the General Assembly and approved by a margin of 61%–38%. It amended Article XV, Section 11 of the Ohio Constitution to define marriage as being between "a man and a woman", thus excluding same-sex couples.

The amendment was supported by the groups Ohio Campaign to Protect Marriage and the Traditional Marriage Crusade, and opposed by the group Ohioans for Fairness. Additionally, both Governor Taft and Representative Bill Seitz opposed the amendment on the grounds that it was too vague. These laws came at the same time other states passed similar measures in voter referendums.Graham, "Exploring the Impact of Marriage Amendments", 114-115 The LGBTQ rights organization Equality Ohio was founded in response to the passage of Issue 1. The amendment was criticized by legal scholar Wilson Huhn as unconstitutional because it violated "the fundamental right of marriage" and creates "different rules for different people", while enacting opinions against same-sex marriage into law and does not affect opposite-sex and same-sex couples equally.Graham, "Exploring the Impact of Marriage Amendments", 88 In 2009, constitutional law scholar Tiffany G. Graham noted there was "inherent ambiguity...built into the amendment",Graham, "Exploring the Impact of Marriage Amendments", 137 and the executive director of Equality Ohio, Sue Doerfer, stated in 2017 that the amendment "legitimized discrimination" against same-sex couples in the state and "adversely" affected gay people.

In July 2007, the Ohio Supreme Court ruled in Ohio v. Carswell that Issue 1 amendment did not effect the state's domestic violence law.Graham, "Exploring the Impact of Marriage Amendments", 122 Following the decision, Metro Weekly argued that the decision was a "small victory" even though Issue 1 amendment remained in place, and constitutional law expert Marc Spindelman criticized the legal strategy of Lambda Legal in the case. Constitutional law scholar Tiffany G. Graham argued that the court's decision limited the amendment's reach only to same-sex marriage and civil unions, but failed when determining who had legal status, and erred in not declaring the amendment unconstitutional.Graham, "Exploring the Impact of Marriage Amendments", 130, 132-136 In April 2014, Judge Timothy Black declared Ohio's ban on same-sex marriage unconstitutional and stated that Ohio was required to recognize same-sex marriages from other jurisdictions.

On June 26, 2015, the United States Supreme Court ruled in Obergefell v. Hodges that Ohio (along with Michigan, Kentucky and Tennessee) could not deny same-sex couples the right to marry, or refuse to recognize their marriages performed elsewhere; protected under the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. This ruling reversed a November 2014 decision by the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, effectively legalizing same-sex marriage in those states and nationwide. This ruling also invalidated the Issue 1 amendment to Ohio's Constitution. Same-sex marriage has been legal in Ohio since June 2015.

Domestic partnerships and custody