A full session of Mexico's Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation (SCJN) decided by a 9-2 vote on Aug. 10 that same-sex marriages performed in the Federal District (DF, Mexico City) are valid in all the country's states, although each state remains free to regulate marriages performed in its own territory. The court had ruled on Aug. 5 that the DF's law allowing same-sex marriage was constitutional, denying a challenge from federal attorney general Arturo Chávez Chávez.

During the Aug. 10 session the justices began deliberations on the federal government's challenge to the provision in the DF legislation which allows same-sex couples to adopt. (La Jornada, Mexico, Aug. 11)

Update: By another 9-2 vote, on Aug. 16 the SJCN upheld the DF's legalization of adoption by same-sex couples, ruling that there were no legal arguments to prevent homosexuals from adopting children and that to deny them the right to adopt would be "to constitutionalize discrimination." One justice, Arturo Zaldívar Lelo de Larrea, cited studies by the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) indicating that children are happier with same-sex parents. (Milenio, Mexico, Aug. 16)

From Weekly News Update on the Americas, Aug. 15.

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