The Governor of Kentucky, Steve Beshear, says that his state will recognize all same-sex marriages that are performed within Kentucky and in other states. In line with this, he has stated that all of the state’s County Clerks must issue marriage licences to same-sex couples.

This comes after the historic ruling of the United States Supreme Court , which struck down the ban on same-sex marriage that some states had passed. They found that it was rendered invalid under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of The United States Constitution.

The Governor directed the Kentucky Department of Libraries and Archive to provide a revised form of the marriage licences, which will be gender neutral. County Clerks were provided instructions on its use and were told to utilize it immediately.

In his letter to the County Clerks, the Governor said that “Neither your oath [as County Clerks] nor the Supreme Court dictates what you must believe. But as elected officials, they do prescribe how we must act.” In the same letter, he also said that he knows “that Kentuckians are a law-abiding people and will respect the rule of law. After all, the things that unite us as people are much stronger than the things that divide us.”