Nicole Raz
WMAL.com
WASHINGTON (WMAL) — The Virginia legislature has its work cut out for them. Now that the Supreme Court has ruled on same-sex marriage, Virginia has to update its state laws.
“It’s not going to be a simple thing,” Speaker of the Virginia House of Delegates Bill Howell (R-Stafford) told WMAL. “We’ve got thousands of pages of code that have to be looked at.”
Howell and State Senate Majority Leader Thomas “Tommy” Norment asked the Virginia Code Commission to keep in mind the Supreme Court ruling as they conduct their review.
“That’s not going to be a simple task,” says Vice Chairman of the Virginia Code Commission Jim LeMunyon (R-Chantilly). “Although there are provisions in the code dealing with the specifics of marriage, marriage deals with property rights, insurance, it deals with all kinds of things. I think we’re going to find a number of references throughout the code that we’ll have to look at.”
He says changes won’t come quickly, being that there are 63 sections and thousands of pages of the Virginia Code.
“The legislature will have to approve any changes made in the code,” Howell said. “I would suspect rather than having to vote line by line, we’ll be able to consolidate it and take some group votes.”
Howell says he’s not sure whether the legislature will reverse the state Constitutional ban of gay marriage, but he said, “I suspect we will.”
Howell noted that the legislature will also likely take up the issue of adding “sexual orientation” to the list of items for which an employer cannot fire an employee.
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