Constitutional Amendment 2 of 1998 amended the

Constitution of Hawaii The Constitution of the State of Hawaii ( haw, Kumukānāwai o Hawaiʻi) refers to various legal documents throughout the history of the Hawaiian Islands that defined the fundamental principles of authority and governance within its sphere of jur ...

, granting the state legislature the power to prevent

same-sex marriage Same-sex marriage, also known as gay marriage, is the marriage of two people of the same sex or gender. marriage between same-sex couples is legally performed and recognized in 33 countries, with the most recent being Mexico, constituting ...

from being conducted or recognized in

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; haw, Hawaii or ) is a state in the Western United States, located in the Pacific Ocean about from the U.S. mainland. It is the only U.S. state outside North America, the only state that is an archipelago, and the only state ...

. Amendment 2 was the first constitutional amendment adopted in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

that specifically targeted same-sex partnerships. In 1993, the Hawaii State Supreme Court ruled in ''

Baehr v. Lewin ''Baehr v. Miike'' (originally ''Baehr v. Lewin'') was a lawsuit in which three same-sex couples argued that Hawaii's prohibition of same-sex marriage violated the state constitution. Initiated in 1990, as the case moved through the state courts ...

'', , that refusing to grant marriage licenses to same-sex couples was discriminatory under that state's constitution. However, the court did not immediately order the state to begin issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples; rather, it remanded the case to the trial court and ordered the state to justify its position. After the trial court judge rejected the state's justifications for limiting marriage to opposite-sex couples in 1996 (but stayed his ruling to allow the state to appeal to the Supreme Court again), the Hawaii State Legislature passed a proposed constitutional amendment during the 1997 session that would overrule the Supreme Court's 1993 ruling and allow the Legislature to ban same-sex marriage. This constitutional amendment appeared on the 1998 general election ballot as Constitutional Amendment 2. The question that appeared on the ballot for voters was: Amendment 2 differed from amendments that followed in other states in that it did not write a ban on same-sex marriage into the state's constitution; rather, it allowed the state legislature to enact such a ban. On November 3, 1998, Hawaii voters approved the amendment by a vote of 69.2–28.6%, and the state legislature exercised its power to ban same-sex marriage. The language added by the amendment reads: On October 14, 2013,

Hawaii Attorney General The Attorney General of Hawaii ( haw, Loio Kuhina) is the chief legal officer and chief law enforcement officer of Hawaii Hawaii ( ; haw, Hawaii or ) is a state in the Western United States, located in the Pacific Ocean about from t ...

David M. Louie stated in a formal legal opinion that Amendment 2 does not prevent the state legislature from legalizing same-sex marriage, which it did in November 2013 with the Hawaii Marriage Equality Act.

Results of vote

References

See also