The battle to bring marriage equality to New York was fought by some unlikely heroes. The bill’s champion, Democratic Governor Andrew Cuomo, didn’t support gay marriage until 2006, long after predecessors from his party. Ken Mehlman, the Republican strategist who engineered George W. Bush’s re-election in part by campaigning on a constitutional ban on gay marriage–and then came out as a gay man himself–helped marshal support among recalcitrant factions in Albany. Much of the money was ponied up by a cadre of conservative financiers. And then there were the four Republican state senators who bucked their party to nudge the bill over the line, 33 to 29.
The decisive 32nd vote was cast by Republican Stephen Saland, a Poughkeepsie lawyer first elected to the state legislature in 1980. In an interview with TIME — his first with a national publication since his decision to support the bill, thus ensuring its passage — Saland recounted the process of deliberation that culminated in a historic vote.