Oaxaca, Oaxaca - The First Chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation (SCJN) published the second of three judgments in favor of marriage between persons of the same sex, reported Alex Alí Méndez Díaz, attorney for the Oaxacan Front for Respect and Recognition of Sexual Diversity.
With this ruling, Méndez Díaz noted, the Supreme Court confirms that the State Civil Code violates the federal Constitution by discriminating against same-sex couples. The ruling, he said, also exposes the local Congress and Governor Gabino Cue, in the sense that it doesn't matter to them whether they assume "behavior that is undemocratic".
The state Congress, he accused,
"failed again, because instead of legislating for an inclusive Oaxaca, it decided to perpetuate a state of things in which first and second class citizenship exists, where some people have access to all the rights and others are arbitrarily excluded."The governor, he added, also
"freed himself from his rightful responsibility to implement the actions necessary to end this discrimination, but instead signed legislation that has served for nothing."However, the activist said,
"Oaxaca has taken a big step, because it has bequeathed to Mexico the strategy to search for marriage equality throughout the country."Méndez Díaz explained that appeals to the Court against state officials were motivated by the refusal of the Civil Registry to grant applications for marriage to several partners of the same sex.
However, on December 5 of last year, the First Chamber of the Supreme Court granted relief to three couples of the same sex to whom the Civil Registry had denied marriage applications in 2011.
Two years after initiation of these appeals, Méndez Díaz reported, at least one of the three couples who asserted their claim have contracted marriage despite official opposition. Lizeth Citlali Martinez and Montserrat Ordóñez consummated their civil ceremony on March 22 of this year. With the recent judicial decision, Karina Mendieta Perez and Gabriela Castellanos Mota can do the same.
The opinion regarding the second appeal was given by Justice Jorge Mario Pardo Rebolledo. Spanish original