Ireland has overwhelmingly voted to approve same-sex marriage in a constitutional referendum. It is the first nation to legalize gay marriage by a popular vote.
With very high turnout in the majority-Catholic nation, more than 62% voted to legalize gay marriage, according to the BBC.
“More people voted in the same-sex marriage referendum than in any other since the foundation of the State,” the Irish news agency RTE reported. More than 1.9 million people turned out, “compared with over 1.8 million who voted in 2004 in the poll to restrict Irish citizenship,” RTE noted. (Ireland’s population is approximately 4.6 million, according to the World Bank.)