News
Prof. Jennifer Wriggins writes about same-sex marriage for ‘Jurist’
February 5, 2013
PORTLAND, Maine – Professor Jennifer Wriggins, the Sumner T. Bernstein Professor of Law at the University of Maine School of Law, recently contributed a guest column to Jurist, one of the nation’s most widely read legal news websites.
Prof. Wriggins’ column describes the legalization of same-sex marriage in Maine through a citizens' initiative as a significant milestone and model for other states seeking to legalize same-sex marriage. Here’s an excerpt:
“Just after midnight on December 29, 2012, same-sex couples became eligible to marry in Maine, and marriages celebrated elsewhere will be valid in Maine. How did the nation's most rural state come to support marriage licensing for same-sex couples by a margin of 53 percent to 47 percent in November, particularly after voting against marriage in 2009? This vote came from a citizens' initiative petition for a law which had been signed by over 105,000 voters and certified by the state's secretary of state. Of the three states that passed marriage measures in November, Maine's was the only initiative. Citizens in Maryland and Washington state also voted, as did citizens in Maine's 2009 referendum, whether or not to repeal a legislative enactment."
Professor Wriggins' full column in the Jurist is available here.
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Media contact: Trevor Maxwell, communications director at Maine Law
Office: 207-228-8037/ Cell: 207-286-4431/ email: trevor.maxwell@maine.edu
