A judge in Pennsylvania has overturned a ban on gay marriage, making the NY-neighbouring state the last of the Northeastern states to approve legal same-sex weddings in America.
Pennsylvania is the 19th state in the US to legalise gay marriage, and the ruling comes just a day after Oregon ruled gay marriage to be legal. Kind of odd that it took Oregon so long since the culture of the state is so up there with the liberals, but whatever, it’s good that they finally figured out what was right.
‘We now join the twelve federal district courts across the country which, when confronted with these inequities in their own states, have concluded that all couples deserve equal dignity in the realm of civil marriage,’ said US District Court Judge John E. Jones III in Pennsylvania. ‘Because these laws are unconstitutional, we shall enter an order permanently enjoining their enforcement. By virtue of this ruling, same-sex couples who seek to marry in Pennsylvania may do so, and already married same-sex couples will be recognised as such in the Commonwealth.’
There was no actual constitutional amendment barring same-sex couples from marrying, but Judge Jones got rid of a 1996 law banning gay marriage, as well as a bit in Pennsylvania law that would not recognise same-sex couples who’d married in other states.
‘We are a better people than what these laws represent, and it is time to discard them into the ash heap of history,’ he said.
Tru dat, Judge.
This article originally appeared on The Debrief.