Same-Sex Couples Wed in Germany as Marriage Law Takes Effect<br />1, 2017<br />BERLIN — Cheers rang out in the City Hall of Berlin’s Schöneberg district on Sunday as two men, who met 38 years<br />ago, when the German capital was a divided city, became the country’s first same-sex couple to legally marry.<br />In June, Chancellor Angela Merkel surprised many in her conservative Christian Democratic Union, long opposed to changing the law despite growing indications<br />that society widely approved of marriage equality, by expressing openness to allowing a "vote of conscience" on the issue.<br />A previous German law had allowed civil unions between same-sex couples since 2001,<br />but those unions did not offer couples the same legal rights and were considered by many to be a second-class form of marriage.<br />"The transition to the term ‘marriage’ shows that the German state recognizes us as real equals." In June, Germany became the 15th European<br />country to grant same-sex couples the right to marry, after a swift vote in Parliament that followed a brief but emotional debate.<br />Previously, a same-sex partner in a civil union was allowed to adopt the biological child of his or her partner,<br />but a legally recognized couple was not allowed to adopt.<br />Mr. Holland said it was appropriate for the district to hold the first same-sex wedding in the country<br />because it had long been a center of gay life in the German capital.
