Tue. January 20, 2015
Chicago, IL -
Oklahoma's largest LGBT rights advocate said this week that the state has issued more than 3,200 marriage licenses to gay and lesbian couples.
"It's going to level off, but I don't look for it to happen soon," Toby Jenkins, executive director of Oklahomans for Equality, told the Tulsa World. "We're still going to see a high volume of same-sex marriages. I don't look for it to ebb and flow for at least four years."
On October 6, the Supreme Court refused to hear appeals in cases challenging gay marriage bans in Utah, Virginia, Wisconsin, Indiana and Oklahoma, allowing rulings striking down the bans to take effect.
Jenkins said that such licenses have been issued in 23 of Oklahoma's 77 counties. According to the Tulsa World, nearly 70 percent (2,200) of those licenses were issued in the state's two most populous counties: Oklahoma and Tulsa counties.
Plaintiff couple Sharon Baldwin and Mary Bishop, who filed their case shortly after voters approved the ban in 2004, were the first gay couple in Oklahoma to be issued a marriage license.
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