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Going to the chapel and we’re … not so fast
The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruled today that same-sex couples who hail from states where gay marriage is banned cannot legally marry in Massachusetts. The SJC, which was the first court in the nation to legalize gay marriage three years ago, upheld a 1913 state law that forbids nonresidents from marrying in Massachusetts if their marriage would not be recognized in their home state - the law had been challenged by eight same-sex couples from surrounding states.
Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney - who has 2008 presidential aspirations - applauded the ruling, noting: “We don’t want Massachusetts to become the Las Vegas of same-sex marriage. It’s important that other states have the right to make their own determination of marriage and not follow the wrong course that our Supreme Judicial Court put us on.”
What Romney fails to mention, however, is that the 1913 law in question was actually a law designed to prevent interracial couples from coming into Massachusetts to get married, which begs the question: Did the governor in 1913 also applaud the ruling for preventing the Commonwealth from becoming the Las Vegas of mixed-race marriages?
