Colombia: Article 5. The State recognizes, without any discrimination whatsoever, the primacy of the inalienable rights of the individual and protects the family as the basic institution of society. Article 42. The family is the basic nucleus of society. It is formed on the basis of natural or legal ties, by the free decision of a man and a woman to contract matrimony or by their responsible resolve to comply with it. The State and society guarantee the integral protection of the family. The law may determine the inalienable and unseizable family patrimony. The family’s honor, dignity and intimacy are inviolable. Family relations are based on the equality of rights and duties of the couple and on the mutual respect of all its members. Any form of violence in the family is considered destructive of its harmony and unity, and shall be sanctioned according to law. The children born within matrimony or outside it, adopted or conceived naturally or with scientific assistance, have equal rights and duties. The law shall regulate parental responsibility to the offspring. The couple has the right to decide freely and responsibly the number of their children and shall support them and educate them while they are minors or dependents. The forms of marriage, the age and qualifications to contract it, the duties and rights of the spouses, their separation and the dissolution of the marriage ties, shall be determined by civil law. Religious marriages shall have civil effects under the terms established by law. The civil effects of all marriages shall be determined by divorce in accordance with civil law. Also, decrees of annulment of religious marriages issued by the authorities of the respective faiths shall have civil effects within the limits established by law. The law shall determine matters relating to the civil status of individuals and the consequent rights and duties. Costa Rica: Article 51. The family, as the natural unit and foundation of society, is entitled to the special protection of the State. Mothers, children, the elderly and the infirm and destitute are also entitled to such protection. Article 52. Marriage is the essential foundation of the family and is based on the equality of rights between spouses. Article 53. Parents have the same obligations toward children born out of wedlock as to those born within it. Every person has the right to know who his parents are, in accordance with the law. Cuba: Article 35. The State protects the family, motherhood and marriage. The State recognizes the family as the main nucleus of society and attributes to it the important responsibilities and functions in the education and development of the new generations. Article 36. Marriage is the union voluntarily established between a man and a woman, who are legally fit to marry, in order to live together. It is based on full equality of rights and duties of the partners, who must provide for the support of the home and the integral education of the children through a joint effort compatible with the social activities of both. The law regulates the formalization, recognition and dissolution of marriage and the rights and obligations deriving from such acts. Ecuador: Article 67. The family in its various forms is recognized. The State shall protect it as the fundamental core of society and shall guarantee conditions that integrally favor the achievement of its purposes. The family shall be constituted by legal or de facto ties and shall be based on the equal rights and opportunities of its members. Marriage is the union between a man and a woman and shall be based on the free consent of the persons entering into this bond and on equality of rights, obligations and legal capacity. Article 68. The stable and monogamous union between two free individuals without any other marriage ties who establish a common-law home, for the period of time and under the conditions and circumstances stipulated by law, shall enjoy the same rights and obligations as those families bound by formal marriage ties. Adoption shall only be permitted for different gender couples. El Salvador: Article 32. The family is the fundamental basis of society and shall have the protection of the State, which shall dictate the necessary legislation and create the appropriate institutions and services for its integration, well-being and social, cultural and economic development. The legal foundation of the family is marriage which rests on the juridical equality of the spouses. The State shall promote marriage; but the lack of it shall not affect the enjoyment of the rights established in favor of the family. Article 33. The law shall regulate the personal and patrimonial relations between the spouses and between them and their children, establishing the rights and reciprocal duties on an equitable 9