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Couples Celebrate Anniversary of Ruling on Same-Sex Marriage

The Michigan Public Radio Network

(MPRN-Lansing) There were celebrations in four Michigan counties where a year ago same-sex couples crowded into courthouses to get married. 

That was right after a federal judge struck down Michigan’s same-sex marriage ban.

“We’re in exclusive group of 300, but there are 14,000 couples who do not have the opportunity to engage in marriage in the way that we did, and so it’s a bittersweet day of celebration.”

Marsha Caspar and her wife, GlennaDeJong, were the first same-sex couple in Michigan to be married the morning after the ruling. They celebrated their first anniversary with a toast at a fundraiser to help defray the legal costs of challenging Michigan’s same-sex marriage ban.

“The bitter part of today is that other same-sex couples are not able to marry in the state of Michigan, and so we celebrate the 323 couples where the marriage was recognized, but the fight continues,”

said Caspar. The marriages stopped a year ago after the state filed an emergency appeal. The US Supreme Court will hear the challenge to Michigan’s same-sex marriage ban next month.

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