Same-sex marriage in Yukon has been legal since July 14, 2004, immediately following a ruling from the Supreme Court of Yukon. The territory became the fourth jurisdiction in Canada (and the seventh worldwide) to legalise same-sex marriage, after the provinces of Ontario, British Columbia and Quebec. Yukon was the first of Canada's three territories to legalise same-sex marriage, and the only one to do so before the federal legalisation of same-sex marriage in July 2005 by the Parliament of Canada. Court ruling In July 2003, Justice Minister Elaine Taylor said the government was taking a "wait-and-see" approach to same-sex marriage in Yukon, and would prefer for the Supreme Court of Canada or the Parliament of Canada to settle the issue, "I think it's very important to have your ducks lined up, so to speak. The thing that I would hate to see, is that in fact, we did start issuing marriage licenses today or tomorrow, and the bill in fact did not live up to the scrutiny of the Supreme Court of Canada, or perhaps did not even go through the House of Commons. Then there would be somewhat of legal quagmire. We want to bring certainty to those individuals who want to be recognized as same-sex couples. We want to take a responsible position." In January 2004, Rob Edge and Stephen Dunbar were denied a marriage licence at the Vital Statistics Office in Whitehorse. "We could have driven across the border to British Columbia, but that wasn't good enough. My family and I contributed a lot to this community over the years and I wanted to be married here to the man I love. I'm a Yukoner. I don't want a license that's not recognized by my government. I knew my timing was right and that the territory was ready for it.", Dunbar said. The couple brought suit in Dunbar & Edge v. Yukon (Government of) & Canada (A.G.) against the Yukon and federal governments in June 2004. Their lawyer, Jim Tucker, used a novel approach: rather than arguing on the basis of Section 15 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms as in the previous cases, he argued that the Federal Government's failure to appeal the decisions legalising same-sex marriage in Ontario, British Columbia and Quebec signalled a change in Canadian common law regarding marriage. Martha McCarthy, a lawyer who had represented the couples in Ontario and