Michele Granda [staff attorney, Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders (GLAD)]:"The New York State appeals court decision to recognize the valid legal marriage of Patricia Martinez and Lisa Ann Golden contrasts starkly with a recent decision of Rhode Island's Supreme Court on the same issue.

Our Nation has faced marriage across state borders for over 200 years, and state-to-state marriage recognition questions are generally handled under traditional family law conflict of law principles. That body of law has handled vexing public policy issues of similar magnitude in the past (e.g., inter-racial marriage, polygamy, divorce), and the New York appeals court quite correctly ruled that we are not on a blank slate when it comes to the marriages of same-sex couples. Gay couples should be protected by the same legal rules that have always governed the recognition of out-of-state marriages.

Yet, the Rhode Island Court, when asked to rule on the validity of the marriage of two women who sought to divorce in Rhode Island, refused to apply the longstanding legal principles that have been guiding us for hundreds of years. Rhode Island's highest court went out of its way to make an apparent gay exception to the rule and tradition of comity – respect for marriages validly made in the jurisdictions where they took place. The Rhode Island court's ruling was nonsensical and cruel, and as the dissenters noted, it "places the parties, and all those similarly situated, in an untenable position. They are denied access to the Family Court and thus are left in a virtual legal limbo…"

As the New York Times noted, the New York appeals court's decision, by contrast, was both "common-sensical and profound." It is also good law."