WASHINGTON — The wedding ceremony of Margaret Miles and Cathy ten Broeke began at Minneapolis City Hall at 11:38 p.m. July 31, 22 minutes before the city’s mayor, R.T. Rybak, could legally marry the women.

Rybak opened City Hall for midnight weddings to usher in the first day that Minnesota’s marriage equality law took effect. He personally married the women moments after midnight.

The moment — an hour after Rhode Island’s marriage equality law took effect — made the state the 13th in the country, plus Washington, D.C., to allow same-sex couples to marry. It also marked a changed city in the long fight of gay and lesbian couples for legal recognition of their relationships.

Forty-three years ago, Richard Baker and James Michael McConnell were denied a marriage license in Minneapolis because they were both men. They sued to force the county to allow them to marry, but lost in an unceremonious dismissal of their appeal at the United States Supreme Court.