The U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark decision uniformly legalizing gay marriage across the United States in June 2015 not only established a legal framework allowing same-sex unions, but it indirectly provided gay spouses with immediate access to divorce courts. That remedy was often previously denied to gay couples who traveled to marry in those U.S. states who allowed gay marriage, but who subsequently returned to live in states that not only outlawed gay marriage, but refused to recognize such unions for the purpose of dissolving them.
Prior to the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision, same-sex couples who wished to separate in states that did not recognize gay marriage often had to take a circuitous route through the court system in their “disapproving” home state in order to resolve competing issues to property, support, and even child custody. This was often the result of laws requiring established in-state residency to obtain divorces in those states that authorized same-sex marriage. In short, a same-sex marriage was usually not portable for the purposes of obtaining a legal divorce.
Not only has the legalization of gay marriage in the U.S. created a corollary legal right to divorce, but it has broadly extended a number of specific legal rights formerly held only by married men and women to same-sex couples. Premarital agreements, alimony, and child custody rights are all now available to gay spouses as the law of the land.