Same-sex marriage in Florida

In addition, a state court ruling in Pareto v. Ruvin allowed same-sex couples to obtain marriage licenses in Miami-Dade County on the afternoon of January 5, 2015.

In 1977, following the success of the Save Our Children campaign in overturning an LGBT rights ordinance in Miami, the Florida Legislature enacted legislation banning same-sex marriage as well as adoption by gays and lesbians.

Governor Lawton Chiles said: "I believe that, by and large, most Floridians are tolerant and will one day come to view a broader range of domestic partnerships as an acceptable part of life.

Senator Tina Polsky filed a bill to repeal the statutory ban in December 2022,[7][8] but it failed to pass before the end of the legislative session.

On March 13, 2014, attorneys for the American Civil Liberties Union filed a similar suit, Grimsley v. Scott, in the same court on behalf of South Florida LGBT advocacy group SAVE Dade and eight same-sex couples already married in other states, asking the court to order Florida to recognize their marriages.

Hinkle explained that his order applied only to the specific circumstances presented by the plaintiffs seeking relief, but that all Florida clerks should understand from his ruling that the U.S. Constitution required them to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples.

The lawsuit was voluntarily dismissed after extensive discussions with LGBT rights legal experts who suggested that Baehr v. Miike, a same-sex marriage case from Hawaii, would be a better first test on this issue.

[28] In March 1997, a three-judge panel of the Florida Fifth District Court of Appeal affirmed a decision by Circuit Judge Edward M. Jackson in Posik v. Layton recognizing as enforceable a "nuptial-type agreement" between two women from Brevard County.

[28] The court ruled that the support agreement, which detailed that Layton would pay liquidated damages in the amount of $2,500 a month if the couple separated, was valid in Florida.

In 2001, after the initial dismissal of the lawsuit, the Florida Fifth District Court of Appeal ruled in Frandsen v. County of Brevard that the denial of marriage licenses to same-sex couples did not violate the State Constitution's equal protection for gender classifications.

[30] On February 25, attorney Ellis Rubin filed suit in Broward County on behalf of 170 gay men and lesbians who sought the right to marry.

The suit, brought against Broward County Clerk Howard Forman was, according to the NBC News, "believed to be the first formal legal challenge to the state law specifying that marriage licenses be issued only to parties consisting of one male and one female."

[31] Broward Circuit Judge Richard Eade rejected a bid by Liberty Counsel to intervene in the case in support of the ban.

[32] On March 18, the Mayor of Tampa, Pam Iorio, signed an order, effective the following year, extending health care benefits to the domestic partners of city employees.

Liberty Counsel led counter suits against the couples in "a move designed to intimidate anyone suing for legal marriage", but they were later dropped.

It named Miami-Dade County Clerk Harvey Ruvin as defendant because his office had refused to issue marriage licenses to the couples.

She found that Florida's same-sex marriage ban and related statutes deprived couples due process and equal protection of the laws as guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment.

[39] Same-sex couples from across the state began marrying the next day, on January 6, when Judge Hinkle's stay in the Brenner case expired.

[40] On April 1, 2014, plaintiffs Aaron Huntsman and William Lee Jones filed suit in the Sixteenth Judicial Circuit Court of Florida against Monroe County Clerk Amy Heavilin, after they were denied a marriage license.

On August 5, she ruled that Simpson was entitled to be recognized as Bangor's surviving spouse, and that Florida's constitutional and statutory provisions prohibiting this recognition were unconstitutional as applied to this case.

[48] On January 15, 2014, Mariama Shaw, a Tampa woman who had married her wife in Massachusetts, filed a petition for divorce in the Thirteenth Judicial Circuit.

[54] Attorney General Bondi said the state did not appeal because it was not a party to the case, and Cohen scheduled a final divorce hearing for September 11.

While there are no records of same-sex marriages as understood from a Western perspective being performed in Native American cultures, there is evidence for identities and behaviours that may be placed on the LGBT spectrum.

Many of these cultures recognized two-spirit individuals who were born male but wore women's clothing and performed everyday household work and artistic handiwork which were regarded as belonging to the feminine sphere.

[59] The Timucua recognized two-spirit individuals, known as chocolo yucha (pronounced [ˈtʃokolo ˈjutʃa]),[60] who were born male but typically wore at least some female clothing, and could be distinguished from both women and men by the color of the feathers in their hair.

Their work in the community included hauling provisions for men going to war, preparing dead bodies for burial, and tending to people with contagious diseases.

[61] René Goulaine de Laudonnière reported in 1564 that he had encountered several Timucua two-spirit people, including one serving as an emissary of a Timucuan king.

According to Jacques le Moyne, "because they were strong, [two-spirit people] accompanied warriors to battle, carrying provisions and tending to the injured.