Bermuda Legalized Marriage Equality (Again)!
While one country’s Supreme Court has disappointed LGBTQ people, another country’s has just struck a historic win for LGTBQ rights.
Last year, Bermuda legalized same sex marriage after a long-term case worked its way up the court system and eventually found its way on the island nation’s Supreme Court floor.
While many celebrated and held weddings, they didn’t have long to celebrate as marriage equality was soon taken away from them.
Lawmakers in Bermuda’s parliament decided that they wanted to revoke same-sex marriage and instead replace it with domestic partnerships. They thought it would be better to keep marriages and gay unions separate.
After voting on this reversal of gay marriage, parliament updated their national law to create this split. That law officially came into play this week on June 1st.
Thankfully though, the Supreme Court immediately rolled back that decision.
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More: U.S. Supreme Court Rules In Favor Of Anti-Gay Baker
After only a few days of the “marriages/domestic partnerships” setup, Bermuda’s Supreme Court ruled against the appeal. The Supreme Court voted against the Domestic Partnership Act (or DPA) while saying that it was unconstitutional.
Specifically, Chief Justice Ian Kawaley said that sections in the Act were not in line with provisions in the Constitution which give the right to freedom of conscience and creed.
As such, both domestic partnerships and same-sex marriage are now legal and available to same-sex couples.
Jason Lord and Hartnett-Beasley are part of the LGBTQ rights group called OUTBermuda. They helped the case that would give Bermuda marriage equality the first time around.
The two recently released a statement celebrating the Bermudan Supreme Court’s decision:
“We all came to the court with one purpose. That was to overturn the unfair provisions of the Domestic Partnership Act that tried to take away the rights of same-sex couples to marry.”
“Revoking same-sex marriage is not merely unjust, but regressive and unconstitutional; the Court has now agreed that our belief in same-sex marriage as an institution is deserving of legal protection and that belief was treated by the Act in a discriminatory way under Bermuda’s Constitution.”
“We continue to support domestic partnership rights for all Bermudians to choose, but not at the expense of denying marriage to some.”
Congratulations Bermuda!
