Switzerland has voted by a wide margin to allow same-sex couples to marry, bringing the Alpine nation into line with many others in western Europe.
According to ABC Denver, Official results showed that the measure passed in a referendum on Sunday with 64.1% of votes. It won a majority in all of Switzerland’s 26 cantons or states.
Switzerland’s parliament and the governing Federal Council supported the “Marriage for All” measure last year, but opponents seeking to limit marriage unions between a man and a woman forced the referendum that was voted on, The New York Times reports.
In addition to gay marriage, the Times reports that voters approved a referendum that grants lesbian couples access to sperm banks and allows same-sex couples to adopt children. According to Yahoo News, Agence France-Presse reports that Swiss Justice Minister Karin Keller-Sutter said same-sex marriages will likely be able to take place beginning July 1, 2022.
“Whoever loves each other and wants to get married will be able to do so, regardless of whether it is two men, two women, or a man and a woman,” Keller-Sutter said when the news of the referendum’s passage was announced. “The state does not have to tell citizens how they should lead their lives.”
The passage of the referendum is historic in Switzerland, which has been traditionally conservative and was one of the last countries in Europe to extend the right to vote to women. (While most women in Switzerland gained the right to vote in federal elections in 1971, one Swiss canton didn’t grant suffrage to women until 1991.)
