Hello, [Now I've got 'party in the USA' stuck in my head] Okay, so in FRIENDS in 1996 Carol got married to Susan. So I thought homosexual marriage was already legal there, but then when I found out it wasn't legal until 2015, I got confused. Can anybody tell me why Carol and Susan were able to get married in 1996, when it wasn't legal until 2015? [and they didn't mention doing anything illegal]. Thank-you.
It was legal in some states before 2015 but it was only a few months ago that it became legal in all states.
No state had marriage equality back in 1996. The earliest states to allow it allowed it about 10 years ago, and it wasn't national until earlier this year. I've never seen that Friends episode, so I can't comment. However, the marriage could have been a wedding that simply was not recognized as a marriage by the state. That sort of thing happened, although it seemed that some other label would be applied (e.g., "commitment ceremony").
The first United States state to legalize same-sex marriage was Massachusetts on May 17th, 2004. We have fifty states, which is a hell of a lot. Over time, more and more states legalized it. In my state, Illinois, it took until June 1st, 2014 to legalize it. Finally, our supreme court made it legal for every single state on June 26th, 2015. So all of the states that didn't have it legalized by that date (I don't know which states, but I have a feeling they were southern states), it was all now legal. That's why it was such a big deal over here.
Technically: It was officially signed into law here in Illinois on November 20th, 2013 but didn't go into effect until June 1st 2014. Also, a court ruled that marriages could begin earlier in Cook County (I think in February), so there were over 1,000 legally performed marriages before June. Most of the states that legalized it before 2015 did so through court rulings. 2014 was basically all court rulings which more than doubled the number of states where it was legal. Only 11 states legalized it through the democratic process (Illinois being one of them). There's several maps on Google that show which states legalized same-sex marriage and the year. I hope this answers the poster's question. Btw, here's a cute video that depicts the timeline of gay marriage in the US. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i2crZ4_xgKg
Oh, I knew about that thing in 2013- I remember the things I looked forward to in 2014, which included seeing HTTYD 2 and finally having my state legalize gay marriage. Also, Cook County granted early marriages? I live so close to there, and I didn't even know!
There was a case where a dying woman wanted to marry her partner and she didn't have enough time to make it to June, so the courts allowed marriages to begin early in Cook County. Pretty sad that people tried to prevent them from marrying in the first place.
Huh. I've been watching Friends most of my life and that's never occurred to me. I have seen that episode, though it's been a while, but my guess is with BMC77. Carol and Susan could have a marriage ceremony but it wouldn't be legally binding.
