Marriage For All: The Swiss Must Vote

In Switzerland, the law opening marriage to same-sex couples is not yet set in stone. Yet adopted in mid-December by the Swiss Parliament, this text on marriage for all will be submitted to a referendum. Indeed, opponents have gathered the necessary signatures to request a referendum, the authorities said on Tuesday April 27. At a date still unknown, the Helvetians will therefore have to answer whether, yes or no, they agree with this law. The Swiss usually vote 3 or 4 times a year on a multitude of subjects, as provided for in the Swiss system of direct democracy.

In Switzerland, most of the laws and other acts passed by Parliament enter into force without the people being called upon to express their views. But a referendum is possible in particular when citizens who oppose certain decisions collect 50,000 valid signatures within 100 days of the official publication of the act. The referendum request has collected more than 61,000 valid signatures, the Federal Chancellery said in a statement, so the Swiss will have to vote on the subject.

A long parliamentary fight

Opponents of the text had warned that they would launch a referendum. Among them are representatives of the right-wing populist party UDC (first Swiss party) and the Federal Democratic Union (UDF), a small group that defends Christian values. For the SVP, it is thus “intolerable to want to place marriage on an equal footing with any form of cohabitation”.

Several years after many other Western European countries, the Swiss parliament on December 18 approved the bill authorizing marriage for same-sex couples. The adoption of civil marriage for all has its origins in a project tabled by the Vert’liberals in 2013, and is the result of a long parliamentary battle. The adopted text allows homosexuals and lesbians to unite and for the latter to have access to sperm donation, one of the most controversial points. However, it does not include surrogacy, which could allow male couples to have children. Until now, same-sex couples could enter into “registered partnerships” that did not give them the same rights as a marriage.