A recent ruling that prohibits gay couples from heading to Massachusetts just to get married is a justified and understandable reaction to what could have been a difficult situation for the state.

The Massachusetts Supreme Court recently ruled that same-sex couples who hail from states that prohibit gay marriage cannot legally marry in Massachusetts unless they plan to become state residents, according to an Associated Press article.

That decision was based on a 1913 law Gov. Mitt Romney, a Republican, had invoked from the beginning of the debate over gay marriage. The law said couples could not marry in Massachusetts if that marriage would not be valid in their home state, according to the article.

Three years ago, the court made Massachusetts the first state in the nation to recognize gay marriage. Approximately 6,000 couples have since married in Massachusetts. Eight couples from surrounding states spearheaded the challenge to the 1913 law.

While applying such an old law to a relatively new debate seems odd, Mas-sachusetts doesn’t have a responsibility to facilitate gay marriages across the nation. In order for a person or group of people to receive the rights afforded by a given state, they should have to become residents of that state.

According to the Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders, gay couples can seek civil unions in Vermont and Connecticut, and other states are still debating the issue of gay marriage, so there are still future options.

That being said, it may be the state’s fault for taking a stand on the issue before considering the issue of attracting out-of-state couples if other states don’t follow suit in approving gay marriage. This latest decision, in turn, damages the precedent the state set for supporting gay marriage, impeding on civil rights of homosexual
couples.

Either way, the decision, however disappointing for gay couples, was one that Massachusetts has a right to make as the struggle for gays to marry continues.