Canada Legal News - NYC recognizes Canada's gay marriages

April 7, 2021

NYC recognizes Canada's gay marriages
Recognition available to 45% of state's population

Today New York City became the latest locality in New York State to announce that it will fully respect the marriages and civil unions of same-sex couples performed in jurisdictions like Massachusetts, Vermont, Canada and other countries.

Empire State Pride Agenda was informed about the decision in a letter, dated April 6, that it received from Anthony W. Crowell, Special Counsel to Mayor Bloomberg. The letter was in response to earlier inquiries the Pride Agenda made to the City about the matter.

"We applaud Mayor Bloomberg for taking a step in the right direction and working to ensure that same-sex couples who live in New York City and have been married in Canada, Massachusetts and other places are now as legally married as a couple who got a license at City Hall," said Van Capelle.

New York City becomes the sixth locality in New York State to proactively affirm that it recognizes marriages of same-sex couples, according them the same rights as all other marriages within their local jurisdictions. Other localities are Buffalo, Rochester, Brighton, Ithaca and Nyack. These announcements follow Attorney General Eliot Spitzer's opinion that marriages and civil unions of same-sex couples performed outside the state should be treated as valid marriages in New York State.

Crowell said in the letter sent to the Pride Agenda, "On behalf of the Mayor, I am pleased to confirm to you that it is the policy of the City of New York to recognize equally all marriages, whether between same- or opposite-sex couples, and civil unions lawfully entered into in jurisdictions other than New York State, for the purposes of extending and administering all rights and benefits belonging to the couples, to the maximum extent allowed by law."

"The Mayor's proactive announcement on same-sex marriage means that 8,591,000 of New York State's 18,976,457 people, or more than 45% of the state's population, live in jurisdictions where same-sex marriage is a legal fact," said Van Capelle. "Given that Massachusetts has a population of only 6,349,000 people, there are now more New Yorkers living in jurisdictions where same-sex marriage has been declared legal than there are people in all of Massachusetts."

Press release from Empire State Pride Agenda. Founded in 1990, the Empire State Pride Agenda is New York's statewide civil rights organization committed to achieving full equality and justice for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) New Yorkers and their families.