The Supreme Court of Mexico on Wednesday issued a unanimous ruling in favor of three same-sex couples seeking to marry in the southern state of Oaxaca, paving the way for universal marriage rights throughout Mexico.
The actual ruling won’t be published for a little while, but the gay rights advocates who brought the case are proclaiming that today’s ruling “opens the door to equal marriage in the whole country,” reported After Marriage.
The court previously ruled in 2010 that same-sex unions performed under a Mexico City ordinance had to be recognized nationwide. With this precedent, the remaining bans on gay marriage in most Mexican states could quickly fall.
This ruling does not immediately eliminate marriage statutes limiting unions to a man and a woman — the Mexican Supreme Court doesn’t have the power to strike down state laws like that en mass as the United States Supreme Court does. But the attorney who brought the case, Alex Alí Méndez Díaz, said before the ruling that victory would mean the beginning of the end for same-sex marriage bans in Mexico.
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After Marriage noted that the case “could have repercussions” outside of Mexico — by expanding this precedent to include the right to marry, courts in other Latin American countries that recognize the Inter-American Accord on Human Rights could follow this precedent and determine that marriage rights are also protected in their countries.
A case brought by three couples trying to strike down Chile’s ban on gay marriage has already begun making its way through the international judicial system.”
