Gay marriage now effectively legal in Mexico
Supreme Court allows same-sex couples to seek injunctions against marriage bans, even as the laws remain on the books
It seems Mexican gays and lesbians have something else to celebrate this Pride month.
Mexico’s Supreme Court ruled on June 3 that any state law restricting marriage to heterosexuals is discriminatory, but the details of that ruling did not become public until this week. As a result, same-sex couples in Mexico can begin the process of petitioning the courts to allow them to legally marry, even if the state they live in still has a law on the books defining marriage as the union of one man and one woman.
As reported by The New York Times, the court’s ruling explicitly rejects the argument made by gay marriage opponents that the purpose of matrimony is solely for procreation and child-rearing.
“As the purpose of matrimony is not procreation, there is no justified reason that the matrimonial union be heterosexual, nor that it be stated as between only a man and only a woman,” the ruling reads. “Such a statement turns out to be discriminatory in its mere expression.”
However, the ruling is considered a “jurisprudential thesis,” meaning that it does not directly repeal any law prohibiting same-sex marriages. Still, couples can now seek injunctions from district judges, who would be required to rule in favor of same-sex nuptials in order to comply with the high court’s ruling finding individual state bans discriminatory.
The Times also notes that civil registry authorities can still block couples from marrying, at least temporarily. And the appeals process to getting an injunction can take months and costs thousands of dollars, meaning that same-sex couples without significant financial resources are less likely to be able to weather the appeals process than their more well-off counterparts.
Legislators in Mexico City, which is an independent federal district, legalized same-sex marriage in 2009. That law went into effect in March 2010, allowing same-sex couples to not only marry but adopt children.
Among the other 31 states in the country, only three — Quintana Roo, where Cancun is located, and the states of Chihuahua and Coahuila, near the Texas border — license same-sex marriages, with Chihuahua’s governor announcing last Friday that his administration would no longer stand in the way of same-sex couples wanting to get married. The Mexican Supreme Court ruled in 2010 that the other 31 states had to recognize same-sex marriages legally performed in the federal district. That decision set the stage for the ruling earlier this month, with the nation’s courts deciding, nearly every time, in favor of allowing same-sex couples to wed.
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