Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote that the plaintiffs asked "for equal dignity in the eyes of the law. The Constitution grants them that right. The ruling brings to an end more than a decade of bitter legal battles. Same-sex couples in several affected states including Georgia, Michigan, Ohio and Texas rushed to wed on Friday.
However officials in other states, including Mississippi and Louisiana, said marriages had to wait until procedural issues were addressed. President Barack Obama said the ruling was a "victory for America". However, Christian conservatives condemned the decision.
Former Arkansas governor and presidential candidate Mike Huckabee called it "an out-of-control act of unconstitutional, judicial tyranny". And Kellie Fiedorek, a lawyer for an anti-gay marriage advocacy group, said the decision "ignored the voices of thousands of Americans".
Greg Abbott, the governor of Texas, a state where marriages licences will now be issued to same-sex couples, said the justices "have imposed on the entire country their personal views on an issue that the Constitution and the Court's previous decisions reserve to the people of the states".
A sea of rainbow flags overwhelmed the few anti-gay marriage activists who reacted in disbelief, and the demonstration seemed to turn into a street party. The Human Rights Campaign Foundation tracks developments in the legal recognition of same-sex marriage around the world.
Working with our network of alumni and partners, we lift up the voices of local advocates and share tools, resources, and lessons learned to empower movements for marriage equality. Austria: The Constitutional Court of Austria ruled on December 4, that denial of marriage equality was discriminatory, legalizing same-sex marriage.
Marriage equality took effect January 1, Taiwan: The Taiwan Constitutional Court ruled in that marriage could not be restricted to opposite-sex couples and gave parliament two years to enact legislation legalizing same-sex marriage.
Parliament passed legislation to legalize same-sex marriage which went into effect May 24, , making Taiwan the first country to enact marriage equality in Asia. The Supreme Court set May 26, as the deadline for the National Assembly to enact such legislation, but it did not meet that deadline, and marriage equality came into effect on that date. Switzerland : On December 16, , the Swiss Parliament overwhelmingly passed legislation extending marriage to same-sex couples. In , it issued an advisory opinion to Costa Rica that signatories of the American Convention on Human Rights are obliged to make same-sex marriage legal.
In , the ECJ determined that all EU countries were required to recognize the same-sex marriages of EU and non-EU citizens for purposes of immigration, regardless of whether same-sex marriage is legal in those countries. In recognition of this decision, the Supreme Administrative Court of Bulgaria affirmed in that the country would recognize such same-sex marriages for the purposes of immigration. In , a same-sex couple in Minnesota applied for a marriage license and was denied. The case was brought to the Minnesota Supreme Court and brought the question of civil marriage rights for same-sex couples to the public attention.
Unfortunately, many of these early cases were unsuccessful. In , the first mass same-sex wedding ceremony took place on the National Mall, where almost 2, same-sex couples were married. In , court rulings in New York and California defined same-sex couples as families. Massachusetts became the first state to legalize gay marriage in California and Connecticut legalized gay marriage in , followed by Iowa , Vermont , and New Hampshire.
Legalization came through state courts, the enactment of state legislation, or the result of the decisions of federal courts until
0コメント