It looks like same-sex couples from most of the country will not be able to marry in Massachusetts. From
today's Boston Globe:
Attorney General Thomas F. Reilly said yesterday that Massachusetts marriage law will forbid same-sex couples from at least 38 other states to get married here after May 17, when gay matrimony becomes legal.
Reilly, addressing the issue for the first time at a press conference yesterday, said a 1913 Massachusetts law prevents out-of-staters from getting married here if they are not eligible for marriage in their home state. The law was originally written to block interracial marriages, but has gained new relevance since the state's high court legalized gay marriages on Nov. 18.
I have to say, this is not a surprise. Here is the law Reilly is working from (
General law 207, Section 11):
No marriage shall be contracted in this commonwealth by a party residing and intending to continue to reside in another jurisdiction if such marriage would be void if contracted in such other jurisdiction, and every marriage contracted in this commonwealth in violation hereof shall be null and void.
There are currently 38 states that have some form of DOMA. Thus, at a maximum, folks from the following 11 states will be able to get marriage licenses here in MA:
Connecticut
Delaware
Maryland
New Hampshire
New Jersey
New Mexico
New York
Oregon
Rhode Island
Vermont
Wyoming
Now, it's not completely clear yet, whether folks from those states will be able to marry. Mit Romney (boo, hiss) believes that since no state explicitly recognizes such marriages, no one should be able to marry here, and he may try to stop them. Again, from the Globe article:
A spokesman for Governor Mitt Romney argued that gay couples from any state other than Massachusetts would not be eligible for marriage here, because gay marriage is illegal everywhere else.
[snip]
Eric Fehrnstrom, Romney's communications director, said yesterday that same-sex couples will also be required to sign such affidavits after May 17. Fehrnstrom said the governor would probably forbid the issuance of licenses to same-sex couples from any other state.
"I'm not aware that gay marriage is legal anywhere," Fehrnstrom said. "If people were to come here, they would have to establish residency. I mean, we have people file affidavits now affirming that if they are from out of state, there's nothing in their home state that prohibits them from getting married."
One of the lovelier aspects of this debate is that the section of law being drawn upon for this was passed in 1913. The reason for its passage: anti-miscegination laws in other states.