NYS Court of Appeals Leaves 4th Dept Decision Recognizing Canadian Gay Marriage In Place

NY Sun (Joseph Goldstein): Court Decision Is Victory For Gay Marriage Backers

Gay marriage advocates have won a partial victory in New York, as the state’s highest court has left in place a lower court ruling that recognized a lesbian couple as being married. The Court of Appeals declined yesterday to review the mid-level appellate court’s decision to recognize the couple’s Canadian marriage, the first such ruling by an appellate court in New York State. For now, that lower court decision remains binding across the state. In 2006, the state’s Court of Appeals found that there was no right to same-sex marriages under the state constitution, leaving unanswered the question of whether the state would recognize same-sex marriages and civil unions performed in other states and abroad.

***

Democrat and Chronicle (Gallagher and Craig): County at crossroads over same-sex benefits lawsuit

The state’s highest court Tuesday sent back to a lower court a case involving whether Monroe County has to recognize a marriage between two women, leaving the county to determine whether to continue its appeal challenging same-sex marriage. The Court of Appeals refused to hear the case of Patricia Martinez, an employee of Monroe Community College, who sued the county after it refused to grant benefits to Martinez’s female partner, Lisa Ann Golden, whom she married in Canada in 2004. The state Supreme Court ruled initially that they were not entitled to benefits, but that was overturned 5-0 by the mid-level Appellate Division, Fourth Department, of the state Supreme Court