Referendum 74

Washington state’s historic marriage equality law took effect Sunday, and beginning just one minute past the stroke of midnight, the first same-sex couple took their vows.

At just one minute after midnight Thursday, Washington state began issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couple, becoming the first of three states to do so in the coming weeks after voters approved marriage equality measures on Nov. 6.

In a sweep of election night victories for marriage equality, voters in Washington state approved Referendum 74, affirming the state’s same-sex marriage law, and granting gay and lesbian couples the freedom to marry.

In an email to it 56,000 employees, Seattle-based retailer Nordstrom on Thursday announced its support for marriage equality, and the Washington state ballot initiative, Referendum 74, that would legalize same-sex marriage.

YAKIMA, Wash. — Same-sex marriage “jeopardizes freedom rather than expands it,” and “endangers our religious liberty and the right of conscience,” according to Bishop Joseph Tyson, the Catholic bishop of Yakima, Wash.

SEATTLE — In an unprecedented move, The Seattle Times on Monday declared its support for same-sex marriage, and launched a social media campaign aimed at gaining voter support for Referendum 74, the November ballot initiative that will allow voter to approve or reject the state’s new marriage equality law.

SEATTLE — Washington United for Marriage (WUM), the broad coalition working to defend the state’s marriage law, this week began airing its first television advertisement aimed at gaining voter support for marriage equality.

BELLEVUE, Wash. — Online travel company Expedia.com on Tuesday announced its support for marriage equality and the efforts to approve Referendum 74 in Washington state, November ballot initiative asking voters to approve or reject the state’s new marriage equality law.

OLYMPIA, Wash. — The state of Washington has advised the Catholic diocese in Yakima, Wash., that its plans to conduct a special collection to benefit the campaign to defeat the state’s marriage equality law is illegal under the state’s campaign finance laws.

OLYMPIA, Wash. — Supporters of same-sex marriage in Washington state announced Monday they had raised more than $952,000 in June, bringing total contributions to more than $2 million in its campaign to uphold the state’s new marriage equality law, which is on hold pending the outcome of a November ballot measure.

OLYMPIA, Wash. — A ballot initiative seeking to define marriage as between “one man and one woman” in Washington state has fallen short of signatures needed, and won’t qualify for the November ballot.

SEATTLE — Microsoft Corp. CEO Steve Ballmer and co-founder Bill Gates have each donated $100,000 to the campaign supporting Washington state’s recently passed law legalizing same-sex marriage, reported the Associated Press on Monday.

OLYMPIA, Wash. — Washington state will be one of three states to put marriage equality to a popular vote this November.

Election officials in Washington state said late last week they had identified approximately 1,000 fraudulent signatures submitted on petitions seeking a ballot referendum to overturn the state’s new marriage equality law.

OLYMPIA, Wash. — Opponents of Washington’s newly passed same-sex marriage law on Wednesday submitted an estimated 232,000 signatures to the Secretary of State — all but guaranteeing that the question of whether gays and lesbians can marry in Washington will now be decided by that state’s voters. Preserve Marriage Washington, the petition campaign’s sponsors, planned […]

A Seattle gay man has embarked on a personal letter writing campaign, contacting Washington residents who backed a failed 2009 measure that sought to overturn the state’s “everything but marriage” civil unions law, in hopes that his story might discourage them from supporting this year’s effort to overturn the recently passed marriage equality law.

Opponents of same-sex marriage began collecting signatures in Washington state on Wednesday in hopes of blocking the state’s new marriage equality law before it can go into effect this summer, just one day after a Superior Court judge cleared the way for opponents to begin the petition drive.

OLYMPIA, WASH. — Within hours of Washington state Gov. Chris Gregoire signing a marriage equality bill into law, opponents filed the paperwork necessary to collect signatures for a referendum to overturn the law.