Gay Marriage Legal In Yukon

In Brief, Kingston Whig-Standard
Published July 15, 2004

Same-sex marriage became legal in the Yukon yesterday as a judge changed the territory's common-law definition of marriage to mean the voluntary union for life of two persons to the exclusion of all others.

In a decision delivered to a packed Yukon Supreme Court hearing, Justice Peter McIntyre followed courts in Quebec, Ontario and British Columbia and made same-sex marriage legal in the territory.

The federal attorney general had asked the Yukon court to delay its decision until the Supreme Court of Canada hears arguments on same-sex marriage in October.

McIntyre, however, said "a legally unacceptable result would be perpetuated in the Yukon" if he delayed the decision.