A federal appeals court in Chicago on Thursday upheld two lower court decisions that declared that state bans on same-sex marriage in Indiana and Wisconsin are unconstitutional.

On behalf of the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals, U.S. District Judge Richard Posner wrote that the gay marriage bans in Indiana and Wisconsin threaten "the welfare of American children," reports USA Today.

He added that Indiana and Wisconsin "have given us no reason to think they have a 'reasonable basis' for forbidding same-sex marriage."

The unanimous decision issued by came just over a week after the court heard oral arguments in the two cases.

"The challenged laws discriminate against a minority defined by an immutable characteristic, and the only rationale that the states put forth with any conviction - that same-sex couples and their children don't need marriage because same-sex couples can't produce children, intended or unintended - is so full of holes that it cannot be taken seriously," wrote, the judge who was appointed by President Ronald Reagan, reports the Washington Post.

"To the extent that children are better off in families in which the parents are married, they are better off whether they are raised by their biological parents or by adoptive parents," Posner wrote, the Chicago Tribune reports. "The discrimination against same-sex couples is irrational, and therefore unconstitutional."

This is the third time that a Court of Appeals ruled against state bans against same-sex marriage since the Supreme Court overturned the Defense of Marriage Act in 2013.

The decision comes one day after a federal judge upheld Louisiana's ban on same-sex marriage on Wednesday, claiming that gay couples do not have a fundamental right to marry.

According to U.S. District Judge Martin Feldman, gay marriage supporters failed to prove that the ban is a constitutional violation against equal protection or due process. "He also rejected an argument that the ban violated the First Amendment by effectively forcing legally married gay couples to state that they are single on Louisiana income tax returns," reports USA Today.