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Dissolving a Same-Sex Marriage

By Janice G. Inman
September 02, 2003

American gay couples have a new place to get married. In a landmark ruling last month in Ontario, Canada, the Court of Appeal held that it was unconstitutional to prohibit homosexuals from entering into same-sex marriages, thus opening the way for the first full-fledged same-sex marriage right anywhere outside of Europe. (The Netherlands has permitted same-sex marriage since December 2000, but only to Dutch parties. Belgium has allowed such marriages since January of this year.) The ruling has sent some gay American couples over the border to get marriage licenses and legalize their unions.

Here in the United States, Vermont became the first and only state to allow same-sex civil unions, under Vt. Stat. Ann. tit. 15 ' 1201, et seq., nearly 3 years ago. The law there extends all rights afforded to heterosexual married couples to gay partners.

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