Vermont Begins Issuing Marriage Licenses To Gay Couples

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Vermont’s gay marriage law began taking effect at exactly midnight on Tuesday, a little over four months after state lawmakers voted to override Gov. Jim Douglas’ veto of the legislation and added to the number of states who have legalized same-sex marriages.

Couples and gay advocates will be marking the day with celebrations, one of which is a wedding reception in Essex that will benefit the Vermont People with AIDS Coalition and other groups.

Rallies will be held by members of the Kansas-based Westboro Baptist Church at the capital city, Montpelier, to protest the new marriage law, but one of the state’s leading same-sex marriage groups, the Vermont Freedom to Marry, has urged supporters not to engage with the demonstrators, saying doing so “would only lend relevance and newsworthiness” to their opponents.

Equality Vermont also told members, “September 1st should also be a day to celebrate the LGBT community and our supporters who helped accomplish marriage equality.”

Montpelier Mayor Mary Hooper has released a statement making a similar call, and warning that protesters will “likely, chant slogans and songs… purposely designed to be highly offensive, insulting, and hurtful.”

“The City of Montpelier condemns the Westboro Baptist Church’s message of hate,” the Mayor added. “Surely our high school students, citizens and visitors deserve better than to be subjected to nasty messages denouncing primarily gay people but also Jews, Catholics, fallen soldiers… We are fortunate to live in a country where citizens are guaranteed the right to free speech and free assembly… The community of Montpelier has a tradition of generosity, engagement and thoughtful dialogue. We ask that you rise above and show this group the attention they deserve – none.”

Vermont became the fourth state to allow gay marriages on April 7, when the state House and state Senate voted 100-49 and 23-5, respectively, to override a veto by the governor.

Douglas had made clear his opposition in the weeks of contentious debate during passage of the bill, saying in a statement, “Vermont’s civil union law has extended the same state rights, responsibilities and benefits of marriage to same-sex couples. I believe our civil union law serves Vermont well and I would support congressional action to extend those benefits at the federal level to states that recognize same-sex unions. But like President Obama and other leaders on both sides of the aisle, I believe that marriage should remain between a man and woman.”

Vermont is the first state to legalize same-sex marriages without an order from the court. Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Iowa all allowed such marriages only after bitter court battles. In Iowa, the state supreme court upheld a lower court decision ruling the state’s ban on gay marriages unconstitutional.

A total of six states now allow same-sex marriages, four of which adopted their statutes in the past five months. The District of Columbia has also began recognizing same-sex marriages performed in other states and countries. In addition, Massachusetts, the first state in the nation to legalize same-sex marriages, sued the federal government in July over the constitutionality of the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which provides the federal definition of marriage as the legal union between a man and a woman.

In California, there is a push to repeal the ban on same-sex marriages through a referendum in next year’s ballot.

Proposition 8 was passed November 2008 overturning a California Supreme Court ruling the same year saying gay couples had a constitutional right to be married. In May, the same court rejected by a 6-1 vote a constitutional challenge to Proposition 8, keeping the ban in place and giving social conservatives a victory even as several eastern states moved to amend their marriage laws. But the California court also unanimously declared the 18,000 gay marriages conducted last year legal.

Vermont Begins Issuing Marriage Licenses To Gay Couples

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