A judge has overturned Mississippi’s ban on same-sex adoption, making gay adoption legal throughout the entire US.

U.S. District Judge Daniel Jordan yesterday issued a preliminary injunction against the ban, ruling it unconstitutional in the wake of recent US Supreme Court decisions legalising gay marriage.

The rescinding of the ban follows a legal challenged filed by four same-sex couples last year. “Two sets of our clients have waited many (almost 9 and 16) years to become legal parents to the children they have loved and cared for since birth,” lead attorney for the plaintiffs, Roberta Kaplan said in a statement.

“We hope that it should finally be clear that discrimination against gay people simply because they are gay violates the Constitution in all 50 states, including Mississippi.”

Former Mississippi Governor Ronnie Musgrove signed the ban on adoptions by same-sex couples in 2000, later saying he regretted doing so.

Despite Mississippi’s step forward on equality, the state legislature is currently considering a bill that would allow government employees and some private business people to cite their own religious objections to same-sex marriage to deny services to gay or lesbian couples.