PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) — A lesbian couple “married” in Massachusetts has filed for “divorce” in Rhode Island, setting up a legal conundrum for judges in a state where the laws are silent on the legality of same-sex “marriage.”
Margaret Chambers and Cassandra Ormiston of Providence were “married” after the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ordered that state’s legislature to legalize such unions starting in 2004.
They filed for divorce in Rhode Island on Oct. 23, citing irreconcilable differences, Miss Chambers’ attorney, Louis Pulner, said yesterday. Miss Ormiston declined to comment.
Rhode Island Family Court Chief Judge Jeremiah S. Jeremiah Jr. has yet to decide whether his court has jurisdiction and said he thinks it is the first filing for a same-sex “divorce” in the state. A preliminary hearing was scheduled for Dec. 5.
Although the Massachusetts court had declared that state’s marriage laws unconstitutional, the court had not clarified whether same-sex couples from out of state could “marry” in Massachusetts. In September, a Massachusetts judge decided that nothing in Rhode Island law specifically banned same-sex “marriage” and said Rhode Island couples could legally “marry” there.
“Now the ultimate question is whether the state will recognize or determine whether it has jurisdiction to handle an out-of-state divorce when we don’t have any case law that accepts or rejects same-sex marriage,” Mr. Pulner said.
Rhode Island Attorney General Patrick Lynch said it is up to the courts and legislature to decide whether the state recognizes same-sex unions.
Courts nationwide soon could find themselves facing similar situations, especially as more and more same-sex couples are “married” in Massachusetts, said Janet Halley, a professor at Harvard Law School who researches the topic. Marital status could become an issue in insurance, benefit, child custody and property cases, among others.
Massachusetts is the only state that allows same-sex “marriage.” New Jersey’s high court ruled last month that the state must offer same-sex couples the same rights as married couples but left it to lawmakers to decide by April whether to call such unions “marriages.”
Two other states have civil unions that extend marriagelike rights to same-sex couples — Vermont in accordance with a court order and Connecticut through a vote of its legislature.
In Connecticut, attorneys for eight same-sex couples filed an appeal yesterday with the Supreme Court in a case arguing that the 2005 decision there to legalize same-sex civil unions rather than “marriage” violates the couples’ basic constitutional rights. The lawsuit, dismissed by a lower court in March, says civil unions are inferior in status to marriage.
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