Kentucky House passes sensible legislation to make one type of marriage licence for everyone
The House in Kentucky has approved a sensible piece of legislation which means there is only one kind of marriage licence – for all sexual orientations.
The bill would allow marriage applicants to identify simply as “spouses”, “grooms” or “brides”.
It was passed by the House to settle a debate over whether same-sex couples should have the same type of marriage licence to opposite-sex couples.
The debate stemmed from jailbird County Clerk Kim Davis, who refused to issue marriage licences to gays.
She was later jailed for five days.
However now Governor Matt Bevin, a Republican, has expressed support for the bill, to allow single-marriage forms.
The bill will now go to the Republican-controlled senate, and would offer a possible solution to what should be displayed on marriage licences.
The debate started after the US Supreme Court voted to legalise same-sex marriage in all 50 states.
A Republican-backed law was passed in the state Senate earlier this year which would create separate license forms for gay and straight couples.
The bill would strip the titles “bride/groom” from the licenses for same-sex couples – banning them from being ‘groom and groom’ or ‘bride and bride’, and instead simply stating “first party” and “second party”. Licenses issued for heterosexual couples would maintain their ‘traditional’ wording.
However, according to Kentucky Senator Morgan McGarvey, controversial Clerk Kim Davis passionately spoke at a clerk’s meeting on the issue – against the segregation.
