A federal judge ruled today that Kentucky must recognise same-sex marriages performed in other states, striking down part of the state's ban.
Meanwhile, a gay rights group planned a legal challenge to the Louisiana Constitution's prohibition against recognising same-sex marriages performed legally in other states.
In a 23-page a ruling, US District Judge John G. Heyburn II concluded that Kentucky's laws treat gays and lesbians differently in a "way that demeans them." The constitutional ban on same-sex marriage was approved by voters in 2004. The out-of-state clause was part of it.
The decision came in lawsuits brought by four gay and lesbian couples seeking to force the state to recognise their out-of-state marriages.
Heyburn did not rule on whether the state could be forced to perform same-sex marriages. The question was not included in the lawsuit.
The Forum for Equality Louisiana and four gay married couples have called a today news conference on their planned legal challenge.
The news comes as two homosexual couples challenging a ban in neighbouring Texas on same-sex marriage will take their case to federal court on today in the wake of recent legal victories in two other conservative states.
A 2004 amendment to the Louisiana Constitution says marriage in the traditionally conservative state "shall consist only of the union of one man and one woman," and goes on to prohibit state officials or courts from recognising a marriage "contracted in any other jurisdiction which is not the union of one man and one woman." Seventeen states allow gay marriage, mostly in the Northeast.
