Illinois to allow same-sex marriage law

Wednesday, November 6, 2013

The Illinois House of Representatives voted 61–54 yesterday to approve a law allowing for same-sex marriage. Governor Pat Quinn is expected to sign the bill and ceremonies for same-sex couples are expected to start in June of next year.

State Represeptative Greg Harris, the bill's sponsor, said, "what this bill is about is love, it's about family, it's about commitment".

Bernard Cherkasov from the gay rights group Equality Illinois welcomed the passing of the bill. "The first thought that popped into my mind was all those families around the state that I've met over the past five years in fighting for marriage equality. The couples, their parents, their children, all who have waited for this moment."

The Catholic Conference of Illinois released a statement "deeply disappointed that members of the General Assembly chose to redefine what is outside of its authority: a natural institution like marriage. We remain concerned about the very real threats to religious liberty that are at stake with the passage of this bill".

Have an opinion on this story? Share it!

Sources

AP. "Illinois poised to become largest US state to legalize gay marriage" — The Guardian, November 5, 2013
Monique Garcia and Ray Long. "Lawmakers approve gay marriage in Illinois" — Chicago Tribune, November 5, 2013
Rex W. Huppke, Kim Geiger and Manya Brachear Pashman. "Gay marriage supporters rejoice in Chicago" — Chicago Tribune, November 5, 2013

Share this:

This page is archived, and is no longer publicly editable.

Articles presented on Wikinews reflect the specific time at which they were written and published, and do not attempt to encompass events or knowledge which occur or become known after their publication.

Got a correction? Add the template {{editprotected}} to the talk page along with your corrections, and it will be brought to the attention of the administrators.

Please note that due to our archival policy, we will not alter or update the content of articles that are archived, but will only accept requests to make grammatical and formatting corrections.

Note that some listed sources or external links may no longer be available online due to age.

The text of this article is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License