Iceland: Parliament Votes to Legalize Same-Sex Marriage

The Althingi, Iceland's parliament, voted 49 to 0 (that's right, it was unanimous) to change the legal language of Iceland's marriage statutes to include marriage between "man and man, woman and woman," as well as those between man and woman. It's worth noting that Iceland, a tiny, socially tolerant nation of about 320,000 people was also the first nation to elect an out and proud lesbian as head of state, when Social Democrat Johanna Sigurdardottir was elected as Prime Minister.

Most Christians in Iceland are Protestant, and while the new statute includes language about religious marriage in that it states, roughly, that "ministers will always be free to perform same-sex marriage ceremonies, but never required to perform them," the Icelandic church as not, as yet made a formal decision as a body about whether or not to allow same-sex marriage ceremonies in their churches.

I think it's no a small thing when the nation with the oldest parliamentary system in the world makes a decision like this. The Icelandic parliament, the Alþingi or Althing (quite literally all thing) in English, appears to have first met on the special "law rocks" at the Þingvellir, about 30 miles from Reykjavík, the modern capital, in 930 AD. Parliment now meets in a dedicated hall in Reykjavík.

It is telling that when Johanna Sigurdardottir was elected that the non-Icelandic press was mostly interested in her sexual orientation, while the Icelanders wanted to know her true intentions regarding subsidies and funding education. Did I mention that the vote in favor of allowing same-sex marriage the identical legal status as hetero marriage was unanimous?

Image Credit: Iceland Tourist Board