Bermuda's Domestic Partnership Act 2018: From "living tree" to broken branches?
Bermuda's Domestic Partnership Act 2018: From "living tree" to broken branches?
It is often thought that affording rights is a progressive movement; rights are given to natural legal persons; the rights are normalised in societal expectations and they form part of a body of enforceable rights against the state. On 7 February 2018, Bermuda became the first state in modern history to withdraw the right of same-sex couples to marry, bucking the trend of progressively affording rights. In a recent judgment, the Bermudian Supreme Court has ruled that taking away the right of same-sex couples to marry is unconstitutional. This article will briefly consider the development of the right of same-sex couples to marry in Bermuda, the connection between Bermudian human rights law and the European Convention on Human Rights and ask whether rights afforded under a constitutional arrangement can be taken away.
same-sex marriage, constitutional law, Bermuda, Living Tree
367
Johnson, Marc
3146e8cd-80ea-4ff9-918b-cbf65ea3a724
2018
Johnson, Marc
3146e8cd-80ea-4ff9-918b-cbf65ea3a724
Johnson, Marc
(2018)
Bermuda's Domestic Partnership Act 2018: From "living tree" to broken branches?
European Human Rights Law Review, 23 (4), .
Abstract
It is often thought that affording rights is a progressive movement; rights are given to natural legal persons; the rights are normalised in societal expectations and they form part of a body of enforceable rights against the state. On 7 February 2018, Bermuda became the first state in modern history to withdraw the right of same-sex couples to marry, bucking the trend of progressively affording rights. In a recent judgment, the Bermudian Supreme Court has ruled that taking away the right of same-sex couples to marry is unconstitutional. This article will briefly consider the development of the right of same-sex couples to marry in Bermuda, the connection between Bermudian human rights law and the European Convention on Human Rights and ask whether rights afforded under a constitutional arrangement can be taken away.
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Published date: 2018
Keywords:
same-sex marriage, constitutional law, Bermuda, Living Tree
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Local EPrints ID: 504757
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/504757
ISSN: 1361-1526
PURE UUID: fb83a2dc-177e-45b7-9851-05c1c21823da
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Date deposited: 18 Sep 2025 17:00
Last modified: 19 Sep 2025 02:19
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Author:
Marc Johnson
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