New York
A Manhattan judge ruled last week that gay marriage should be legal in New York City, a decision that one local official said could turn the city “into a gay marriage mecca.” Mayor Michael Bloomberg vowed to appeal, saying that while he supported gay marriage, he didn’t want gay couples descending on City Hall until the issue was resolved in the courts. While the Manhattan judge said a 1909 state law against gay marriage violated the state constitution, judges in other New York cities have upheld the ban, indicating that the state’s highest court will have the final say. Bloomberg said he wanted to avoid the “chaos” that took place last year in San Francisco, which granted marriage licenses to gay couples only to see the unions voided by the courts. “Their great joy was snatched away,” Bloomberg said.
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