Same-Sex Marriages in Costa Rica

On May 23, 2006, the Costa Rican Supreme Court ruled that the ban on same-sex marriage does not contradict the country's constitution . For this verdict, 5 out of 7 judges voted ^[1] .

On July 4, 2013, the country adopted amendments to the Law on Youth, which were aimed at strengthening social guarantees for young people, and also made some changes to article 242 of the Costa Rica Family Code governing “ actual marriage ” ^[2] . Amendments to the bill before its final reading by left-wing MP from the Wide Front, Jose Maria Viyalta Flores Estrada ( Spanish: Jose Villalta ), removed the explicit definition of marriage as a union of a man and a woman from the text of the document and guaranteed equal rights and freedoms to all family unions, did not without discrimination ^{[3] [4] [5]} .

On July 1, 2013, the bill was passed unanimously by the parliament by 45 votes in the last reading, but parliamentarians soon began to fear that the adopted law could legalize same-sex marriage and asked the president of the country, Laura Chinchilla , to veto the bill ^{[2] [6]} . However, the president refused and signed the law on July 4 ^{[7] [3] [6] [4] [8]} .

However, in September 2013, the San Jose Family Court dismissed the lawsuit of a homosexual couple living together for 6 years. Men wanted to recognize their relationship as an “actual marriage”, but the judge refused this, referring to the family code, according to which both registered and actual marriages in the country are possible only between people of different sexes ^[9] . At the same time, in June 2015, the family court granted the claim of another gay couple from Goikoechea , recognizing the union as “de facto marriage” in the sense of the 2013 law ^[10] .

During the presidential and parliamentary elections in 2018, the topic of same-sex marriage became one of the main topics. As a result, the supporter of legalization Carlos Alvarado was ahead of the protégé of the religious lobby Fabrice Alvarado ^[11] .

In January 2018, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights , whose jurisdiction extends to Costa Rica, recognized that the American Convention on Human Rights gives the right to same-sex marriage ^[11] .

On August 8, 2018, the Supreme Court ruled that the prohibition of same-sex marriage is contrary to the country's Constitution. He ordered the parliament to draft a law within 1.5 years. If parliament does not cope with this, same-sex marriages will be legalized automatically ^[11] .

• Presidenta Laura Chinchilla firmó ley con la que diputados habrían dado derechos a parejas gais (Spanish) . La Nación (5 de julio de 2013). Date of treatment July 18, 2013. Archived on September 4, 2013.