The Republican-controlled US state senate voted 33-29 to pass the law that legalises same-sex marriage; New York is the sixth, but largest, US state to do so
The Republican-controlled US state senate voted 33-29 to pass the law that legalises same-sex marriage; New York is the sixth, but largest, US state to do so
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Cuomo signed the bill after the legislature cleared the way to legalise same-sex marriage with a 33-to-29 vote, the first time a state Senate with a Republican majority has approved such a bill.
NEW YORK Governor Andrew Cuomo signed the state's Marriage Equality
Bill that legalises same-sex marriages pic/ getty images
The new law, which will allow same-sex couples in New York to marry within 30 days, drew a sharp rebuke from opponents, who spent millions to try to defeat the measure.
Gay rights activists said the approval of the bill was a key victory for them, in what is seen as the birthplace of the US Gay Rights movement.
But not everyone was celebrating. "We worry that both marriage and family will be undermined by this tragic presumption of government in passing this legislation that attempts to redefine these cornerstones of civilisation," the state's Catholic bishops said in a joint statement released late on Friday. It was signed by Archbishop Timothy M Dolan and seven other bishops.
Opponents of the Marriage Equality law have vowed to take political action against any Republican who voted for the bill.u00a0
Cuomo credited four Republican senators, who joined the majority of the state's Senate democrats for the passage of the bill, saying they were "people of courage".
Cuomo said it would grant same-sex couples equal rights to marry "as well as hundreds of rights, benefits and protections that are currently limited to married couples of the opposite sex."
Activists on both sides of the issue gathered in the state capitol, Albany. They chanted opposing slogans ufffd petitioning for either "marriage equality" or yelling "one man, one woman" in defense of the institution's traditional definition.
New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who courted Republicans to approve the bill, called the vote a "historic triumph for equality and freedom."
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