EDGE San Francisco

As more countries grant equality to the gay community, getting married abroad is becoming more common. But, what happens when you return home? Does your mate gain citizenship?

Here in the US, citizenship is not granted when a same-sex marriage occurs in another country. To remedy this, U.S. representative Jerrold Nadler, a New York Democrat, introduced a bill in Congress. The Uniting American Families Act would allow gay Americans to sponsor their foreign-born partners to become citizens. Gays cannot currently sponsor their partners for citizenship because, in the eyes of the federal government, same-sex partners cannot be considered spouses. The proposed legislation would require same-sex couples to prove that they intend lifelong commitment to one another as permanent partners, that they are financially interdependent, that they are currently unmarried to anyone else, that they are unrelated to each other, and that they are unable to "contract with that person a marriage cognizable under the Immigration and Nationality Act," according to the original bill. The bill would also change terminology to define those couples as "permanent partners" instead of "spouses."

Meanwhile, setting the example for what we need to happen in the US, the Japanese government will recognize the marriages of nationals who legally marry their same-sex partners outside the country. The Japanese justice ministry told local authorities to issue certification to those who want to enter same-sex marriages in foreign countries. Japan does not presently issue domestic marriage licenses to same-sex couples, and has not previously let GLBT nationals sponsor their foreign-born partners for citizenship.

As this was reported in The Advocate, they noted that Japan was one of the nations that supported a recent U.N. document calling for the international decriminalization of homosexuality. Way to go, Japan!