Supreme Court Says Gay Marriages Performed in Mexico City Legal Throughout the Country Queerty
go to original August 22, 2012

A lesbian couple display their marriage certificate. (EFE)

Earlier this month, Mexico’s Supreme Court upheld Mexico City’s same-sex marriage law as constitutional, but on Tuesday the court extended the legality of those marriages to all 31 states.

So basically, any gay marriage registered in Mexico City has to be honored in all of Mexico. Each state, however, is not required to pass same-sex marriage laws of their own.

The court ruled overwhelmingly in favor of the law — 9 to 2 — which grants fundamental rights to same-sex married couples, such as alimony, inheritance rights and health and pension benefits under the country’s federal social security system, the New York Times reports.

“What’s going to happen to a same-sex couple when they cross the border,” asked Justice Arturo Zaldívar, who voted with the majority. “Does this marriage disappear? They go on vacation and they’re no longer married?”

State governments under the conservative National Action Party were outraged at the prospect of having to honor gay marriages from the liberal Mexico City government, arguing that the latter was “establishing civil-registry regulations for the rest of the country.”

The issue of gay adoption is still up in the air as the court must decide if that too is constitutional and, if so, if those adoptions must be recognized throughout Mexico as one of the rights of same-sex couples. That decision could come down from on high as soon as Thursday.

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