Today Federal Judge Terrance Kern struck down Oklahoma's 10 year old marriage equality ban!!!
Though a stay was immediately issued, this is huge news coming from one of the most conservative states in the Union! It also gives marriage equality supporters a boost: Oklahoma happens to fall under the same jurisdiction under the 10th Circuit Court JUST LIKE UTAH!!!
What does this mean? That two different judge's rulings will serve as precedent when the 10th Circuit meets in February and March.
While several Native American nations within Oklahoma already grant the right to marriage equality, this ruling could help make the state the 19th to legalize equality for lgbt Oklahomos.
The state’s ban on marriage by gay and lesbian couples is “an arbitrary, irrational exclusion of just one class of Oklahoma citizens from a governmental benefit,” wrote Judge Kern of United States District Court for the Northern District of Oklahoma, in Tulsa, deciding a case that had languished for nine years. The amendment, he said, is based on “moral disapproval” and does not advance the state’s asserted interests in promoting heterosexual marriage or the welfare of children.
#marriageequality #oklahoma #oklahomos
