New Mexico’s Supreme Court today ruled it unconstitutional to deny marriage licenses to same-sex couples.

That makes the Land of Enchantment the 16th state to allow such unions; Hawaii was the 15th and the law in Illinois goes into effect next June.

According to this article in The Hill, same-sex marriages had already been occurring in eight of New Mexico’s counties “after the unilateral decision of a county clerk to issues same-sex marriage licenses in August. … Historically, New Mexico’s law has not explicitly prohibited same-sex marriage, but county clerks have interpreted the statute as applying only to opposite-sex couples due to the official marriage license application containing ‘male’ and ‘female’ sections.”

Photo: Flag. (New Mexico)

—Chad Blair