After spending 12 years litigating to legalize same-sex marriage in New Jersey, it took Lawrence Lustberg just a few months to achieve it once a golden opportunity presented itself.

The U.S. Supreme Court provided the springboard last June when it partially voided the federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), but it was Lustberg’s swift and decisive stroke of advocacy that resulted in gay couples stepping up to the altar less than four months later.