The legal recognition of same-sex marriage in the United States expanded from one state in 2004 (Massachusetts) to all 50 states in 2015 through various court rulings, state legislation, and direct popular vote. States have separate marriage laws, which must adhere to rulings by the Supreme Court of the United States that recognize marriage as a fundamental right guaranteed by both the Due Process Clause and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, as first established in the 1967 landmark civil rights case of Loving v. Virginia. Same-sex marriages are also licensed in and recognized by Washington, D.C.
Civil rights campaigning in support of marriage without distinction as to sex or sexual orientation began in the 1970s. In 1972, the later-overturned Baker v. Nelson saw the Supreme Court of the United States decline to become involved. The issue became prominent from around 1993, when the Supreme Court of Hawaii ruled in Baehr v. Lewin that it was unconstitutional under the Constitution of Hawaii for the state to abridge marriage on the basis of sex. That ruling led to federal and state actions to explicitly abridge marriage on the basis of sex in order to prevent the marriages of same-sex couples from being recognized by law, the most prominent of which was the 1996 federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA). In 2003, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruled in Goodridge v. Department of Public Health that it was unconstitutional under the Constitution of Massachusetts for the state to abridge marriage on the basis of sex. From 2004 through to 2015, as the tide of public opinion continued to move towards support of same-sex marriage, various state court rulings, state legislation, direct popular votes (referendums and initiatives), and federal court rulings established same-sex marriage in thirty-six of the fifty states.
The most prominent supporters of same-sex marriage are human rights and civil rights organizations, while the most prominent opponents are religious groups, though some religious organizations support marriage equality. The first two decades of the 21st century saw same-sex marriage receive support from prominent figures in the civil rights movement, including Coretta Scott King, John Lewis, Julian Bond, Jesse Jackson, and Mildred Loving. In May 2012, the NAACP, the leading African-American civil rights organization, declared its support for same-sex marriage and stated that it is a civil right.
In June 2013, the Supreme Court of the United States struck down DOMA for violating the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution in the landmark civil rights case of United States v. Windsor, leading to federal recognition of same-sex marriage, with federal benefits for married couples connected to either the state of residence or the state in which the marriage was solemnized. In June 2015, the Supreme Court ruled in the landmark civil rights case of Obergefell v. Hodges that the fundamental right of same-sex couples to marry on the same terms and conditions as opposite-sex couples, with all the accompanying rights and responsibilities, is guaranteed by both the Due Process Clause and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. On December 13, 2022, DOMA was repealed and replaced by the Respect for Marriage Act, which recognizes and protects same-sex and interracial marriages under federal law and in interstate relations.
Gallup found that nationwide public support for same-sex marriage reached 50% in 2011, 60% in 2015, and 70% in 2021.
A study of nationwide data from January 1999 to December 2015 revealed that the establishment of same-sex marriage is associated with a significant reduction in the rate of attempted suicide among teens, with the effect being concentrated among teens of a minority sexual orientation, resulting in approximately 134,000 fewer teens attempting suicide each year in the United States.
History
The history of same-sex marriage in the United States dates from the early 1970s, when the first lawsuits seeking legal recognition of same-sex relationships brought the question of civil marriage rights and benefits for same-sex couples to public attention, though they proved unsuccessful. The subject became increasingly prominent in U.S. politics following the 1993 Hawaii Supreme Court decision in Baehr v. Miike that suggested the possibility that the state's prohibition might be unconstitutional. That decision was met by actions at both the federal and state level to restrict marriage to male-female couples, notably the enactment at the federal level of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA).
On May 17, 2004, Massachusetts became the first U.S. state and the sixth jurisdiction in the world to legalize same-sex marriage following the Supreme Judicial Court's decision in Goodridge v. Department of Public Health six months earlier. Just as with the Hawaii decision, the legalization of same-sex marriage in Massachusetts provoked a reaction from opponents that resulted in further legal restrictions being written into state statutes and constitutions. On August 4, 2004, a Washington jurist became the first trial judge in the nation to rule a state defense of marriage act unconstitutional in Andersen v. King County; the King County Superior Court ruling was narrowly overturned on appeal in 2006. The movement to obtain marriage rights for same-sex couples expanded steadily from that time until, in late 2014, lawsuits had been brought in every state that still denied marriage licenses to same-sex couples.
By late 2014, same-sex marriage had become legal in states that contained more than 70% of the United States population. In some jurisdictions, legalization came through the action of state courts or the enactment of state legislation. More frequently, it came as the result of the decisions of federal courts. On November 6, 2012, Maine, Maryland, and Washington became the first states to legalize same-sex marriage through popular vote. Same-sex marriage had been legalized in the District of Columbia and 21 Native American tribal nations as well.
The June 2013 decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in United States v. Windsor striking down the law barring federal recognition of same-sex marriage gave significant impetus to the progress of lawsuits that challenged state bans on same-sex marriage in federal court. Since that decision, with only a few exceptions, U.S. District Courts and Courts of Appeals have found state bans on same-sex marriage unconstitutional, as have several state courts. The exceptions have been a state court in Tennessee, U.S. district courts in Louisiana and Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. The U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear appeals from that circuit's decision.
On June 26, 2015, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down all state bans on same-sex marriage, legalized it in all fifty states, and required states to honor out-of-state same-sex marriage licenses in the case Obergefell v. Hodges. The United States was the seventeenth country in the world and the second in North America after Canada, to allow same-sex couples to marry nationwide.
Legal issues
The legal issues surrounding same-sex marriage in the United States are determined by the nation's federal system of government, in which the status of a person, including marital status, is determined in large measure by the individual states. Prior to 1996, the federal government did not define marriage; any marriage recognized by a state was recognized, even if that marriage was not recognized by one or more states, as was the case until 1967 with interracial marriage, which some states banned by statute.
Prior to 2004, same-sex marriage was not performed or recognized in any U.S. jurisdiction, but subsequently began to be performed and recognized by law in different jurisdictions through legislation, court rulings, tribal council rulings, and popular referendums.
The Supreme Court's ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges ended all inter-state legal complications surrounding same-sex marriage, as it orders states to both perform the marriages of same-sex couples and to recognize the marriages of same-sex couples performed in other states.
Federal law
According to the Government Accountability Office (GAO) in 2004, 1,138 federal rights and protections are conferred to U.S. citizens upon marriage; areas affected include Social Security benefits, veterans' benefits, health insurance, Medicaid, hospital visitation, estate taxes, retirement savings, pensions, family leave, and immigration law.
Since July 9, 2015, married same-sex couples throughout the United States have had equal access to all the federal benefits that married opposite-sex couples have.
The Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) was enacted in 1996. DOMA's Section 2 says that no state needs to recognize the legal validity of a same-sex relationship even if recognized as marriage by another state. It purports to relieve a state of its reciprocal obligation to honor the laws of other states as required by the Constitution's Full Faith and Credit Clause. Even before DOMA, however, states sometimes refused to recognize a marriage from another jurisdiction if it was counter to its "strongly held public policies". Most lawsuits that sought to require a state to recognize a marriage established in another jurisdiction argue on the basis of equal protection and due process, not the Full Faith and Credit Clause.
DOMA's Section 3 defined marriage for the purposes of federal law as a union of one man and one woman. It was challenged in the federal courts. On July 8, 2010, Judge Joseph Tauro of the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts held that the denial of federal rights and benefits to lawfully married Massachusetts same-sex couples is unconstitutional under the Equal Protection Clause of the U.S. Constitution. Beginning in 2010, eight federal courts found DOMA Section 3 unconstitutional in cases involving bankruptcy, public employee benefits, estate taxes, and immigration. On October 18, 2012, the Second Circuit Court of Appeals became the first court to hold sexual orientation to be a quasi-suspect classification and applied intermediate scrutiny to strike down Section 3 of DOMA as unconstitutional in Windsor v. United States. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Windsor on June 26, 2013, that Section 3 violated the Fifth Amendment.
As a result of the Windsor decision, married same-sex couples—regardless of domicile—have federal tax benefits (including the ability to file joint federal income tax returns), military benefits, federal employment benefits, and immigration benefits. In February 2014, the Justice Department expanded federal recognition of same-sex marriages to include bankruptcies, prison visits, survivor benefits and refusing to testify against a spouse. Likewise in June 2014, family medical leave benefits under the Family Medical Leave Act 1975 were extended to married same-sex couples. With respect to social security and veterans benefits, same-sex married couples are eligible for full benefits from the Veterans Affairs (VA) and the Social Security Administration (SSA). Prior to the Supreme Court's ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges on June 26, 2015, the VA and SSA could provide only limited benefits to married same-sex couples living in states where same-sex marriage was not legal. Effective March 27, 2015, the definition of spouse under the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 includes employees in a same-sex marriage regardless of state of residence. Following the Obergefell decision, the Justice Department extended all federal marriage benefits to married same-sex couples nationwide.
The federal government recognizes the marriages of same-sex couples who married in certain states in which same-sex marriage was legal for brief periods between the time a court order allowed such couples to marry and that court order was stayed, including Michigan. It also recognized marriages performed in Utah from December 20, 2013, to January 6, 2014, even while the state didn't. Under similar circumstances, it never took a position on Indiana or Wisconsin's marriages performed in brief periods, though it did recognize them once the respective states announced they would do so. It had not taken a position with respect to similar marriages in Arkansas prior to the Obergefell decision legalizing and recognizing same-sex marriages in all fifty states. The State Marriage Defense Act was proposed in Congress to force the federal government to follow individual state laws regarding same-sex marriage although it never passed either chamber.
Opponents of same-sex marriage have worked to prevent individual states from recognizing same-sex unions by attempting to amend the United States Constitution to restrict marriage to heterosexual unions. In 2006, the Federal Marriage Amendment, which would have prohibited states from recognizing same-sex marriages, was approved by the Senate Judiciary Committee on a party-line vote and was debated by the full Senate, but was ultimately defeated in both houses of Congress. On April 2, 2014, the Alabama House of Representatives adopted a resolution calling for a constitutional convention to propose an amendment to ban same-sex marriage nationwide.
In 2022, Justice Clarence Thomas named Obergefell v. Hodges as a case that should be revisited in his concurrence of Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, which had overturned Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey on the basis that abortion protection was not a "deeply rooted" right in the Constitution. To prevent the loss of the right to same-sex marriage, the House of Representatives passed the Respect for Marriage Act which would nullify DOMA and protect existing same-sex and interracial marriage licenses. In July, the bill passed 267–157, with 47 Republican representatives joining the Democrats. In December, the Senate passed the bill 61–36, and the House again voted 258–169 to pass it. President Joe Biden signed it into law on December 13, 2022. On November 10, 2025, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear a case that could challenge the Obergefell v. Hodges ruling - which means no more than three justices wanted to take up the case.
State and territorial recognition
Same-sex marriages are licensed in and recognized by all U.S. states and the District of Columbia, as well as all U.S. territories except American Samoa. However, under the Respect for Marriage Act, American Samoa must recognize all marriages between two people that were legally performed in another jurisdiction.
On January 6, 2016, Alabama's Chief Justice, Roy Moore, issued a ruling forbidding state officials from issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples. The ruling had no effect as all Alabama counties continued either issuing marriage licenses to all couples or not issuing licenses at all. In May 2016, Moore was charged with ethics violations by the state Judicial Inquiry Commission for the ruling, subsequently being suspended from the bench for the remainder of his term on September 30 of that year.
Counties not issuing marriage licenses
As of 2020, there are apparently no counties in the United States that do not (or would not) register the marriages of same-sex couples.