Slovenia Votes Against Same-Sex Marriage and Same-Sex Child Adoption

From New Europe:

Slovenes overwhelmingly voted against same-sex marriage and child adoption. With 90% of votes counted on Sunday’s referendum, same-sex legislation introduced by the government earlier this week was resoundingly defeated by 63-37%.

On Sunday, December 20^th, 1,7 million Slovenes went to the polls, in the predominantly Catholic post-Yugoslav Republic.

The Referendum was a reaction to the amendment passed on the marriage and family relations act on March 2015, redefining marriage from “a union between a man and a woman” to the union between “two consenting adults.”

Same-sex couples in Slovenia have rights equivalent to marriage, but the government intended to reintroduce legislation that would allow them to adopt children as well. That was a right already denied to same-sex couples in 2012.

The government abstained from campaigning.

Initially, campaigners managed to gather enough signatures to hold a referendum that would override legislation introduced by the government in March; the government then tried to bloc the referendum, suggesting that a human rights issues are not a matter of majority-minority relations; finally, the Constitutional Court forced the parliament to hold a referendum.

Read more here.