Yucatan approves same-sex marriage with a wide majority
Mexico's State of Yucatan follows in the footsteps of Sinaloa and Baja California, which have also endorsed the union between homosexual couples this summer.
The Congress of the State of Yucatan has approved this Wednesday equal marriage with 20 votes in favor and five against. Only three weeks ago Baja California made the same decision and also this summer, at the end of June, the union between homosexual couples was accepted in Sinaloa. With these three new resolutions, 22 of the 32 Mexican states now recognize this right.
In a long session lasting more than four hours, the deputies of Yucatan voted to modify Article 94 of the State Constitution to redefine the terms: instead of being exclusive between a man and a woman, marriage is now considered "the free and voluntary legal union of two persons with equal rights, duties and obligations".
The road to this reform has not been easy on the peninsula. In 2015, the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation (SJCN) declared unconstitutional to prohibit marriage between same-sex couples for going against the principle of non-discrimination. That left the responsibility on the state congresses, which had to modify their legislation, but several of them have refused to correct their codes. That was the case in Yucatan.
In 2019, in a secret vote, the Yucatecan Congress rejected same-sex marriage. But the PTFY collective filed an injunction against the state legislature for going against the SCJN's mandate and the SCJN forced the legislators to repeat the vote, which finally took place this Wednesday. The resolution has been approved this time with an ample majority.
In the same session, the deputies have prohibited the so-called conversion therapies, which try to modify sexual orientation, and have approved that the crime of femicide does not prescribe. In the same sense, the congressmen have established that in the case of the murder of a woman by her partner, the parental rights of the children will not go to the aggressor but to the grandparents of the minors.
With the entry of Yucatan, Baja California and Sinaloa in the last three months, the Mexican map is advancing in equality, initiated 11 years ago in Mexico City. Although 10 states (Coahuila, Durango, Guanajuato, Guerrero, State of Mexico, Querétaro, Tabasco, Veracruz and Zacatecas) are still reluctant to reform their laws. Homosexual couples in these states have to file an injunction for judges to approve the union on a case-by-case basis, rather than through a procedure before the Civil Registry.
