“I have youth who go, ‘Well, if on the off chance I ever want to get married in about six, seven years, 10 years, 15 years, I’m probably not going to be able to do it here anyway, so I hope I’ve moved to California, New York, or Washington,'” Wilson says. “You will start to see a real economic justice problem,” Carpenter says.īryan Wilson, who co-founded the Pride Center West Texas in Odessa, Texas, says the Respect for Marriage Act is a win for him and his husband, and other LGBTQ couples who are already married, but worries it doesn’t do enough for young or unmarried people in states like Texas. That would exclude such couples from accessing the benefits that come with marriage, including inheritance, tax benefits, and the ability to make health care decisions for a spouse who is unable to make them themselves. The dynamic could create a challenge for couples who want to get married but can’t afford to travel to another state for the license. The Respect for Marriage Act also provides similar protections for interracial marriages. But a same-sex couple wishing to be married in Virginia might have to travel out of state to get their marriage license. If the Supreme Court were to overturn Obergefell, the new federal law guarantees that a same-sex couple who was married in Illinois, for example, would still be recognized as married if they moved to Virginia, which has a ban on same-sex marriage that could be reactivated. In the West, states from Arizona to Montana ban the unions. Some Midwestern states like Ohio, Michigan, and Wisconsin also ban same-sex marriages. The 35 states that currently have inactive bans on same-sex marriage are largely concentrated in the American South, from Texas to Florida, according to an analysis by the Movement Advancement Project, an independent think tank that advocates for equality by conducting research.

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