Michigan will recognize state’s 300 same-sex marriages
Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder said Wednesday he will not appeal a federal court ruling ordering the state to recognize the marriages of more than 300 same-sex couples legally married in the state last year and state benefits will be extended to those married couples.
“The judge has determined that same-sex couples were legally married on that day, and we will follow the law and extend state marriage benefits to those couples,” said Snyder, a Republican who has sought to defend the state’s same-sex marriage ban.
The announcement comes in response to a January ruling by U.S. District Court Judge Mark Goldsmith finding it is unconstitutional for the state to deny legal recognition of marriages performed in March after a federal judge overturned the state’s same-sex marriage ban. On March 21, U.S. District Court Judge Bernard Friedman found a state constitutional amendment approved by Michigan voters in 2004 defining marriage as between a man and a woman in violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The following day, four county clerks opened their offices, waived the traditional three-day waiting period and immediately issued marriage licenses to more than 300 same-sex couples before the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals intervened and stayed the decision. Snyder later said that while those marriages were performed legally, the decision by the 6th Circuit to halt same-sex marriages from continuing pending a final verdict in the case reinstated Michigan law prohibiting same-sex marriage.
In his ruling last month, Goldsmith, who stayed his decision for 21 days to allow an appeal to the 6th Circuit, said the case did not concern the right to marry, but the right to maintain marital status once it has been lawfully acquired under the laws of the state seeking to defeat it.
Although Snyder will not appeal the marriage recognition case, his administration continues to defend the state’s same-sex marriage ban. The decision striking down Michigan’s same-sex marriage ban was later reversed by the 6th Circuit, which broke with other federal appeals courts and found same-sex marriage bans in Michigan, Kentucky, Ohio and Tennessee constitutional. Later this year, the U.S. Supreme Court will review the constitutionality of those states’ bans on same-sex marriage.
“I appreciate that the larger question will be addressed by the U.S. Supreme Court this year,” Snyder continued. “This is an issue that has been divisive across our country. Our nation’s highest court will decide this issue. I know there are strong feelings on both sides of this issue, and it’s vitally important for an expedient resolution that will allow people in Michigan, as well as other states, to move forward together on the other challenges we face.”
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