Chief Justice Roy Moore has ordered Alabama probate judges to uphold the Alabama Sanctity of Marriage Amendment.
Moore issued an administrative order earlier this month saying, “Alabama probate judges have a ministerial duty not to issue any marriage license contrary to the Alabama Sanctity of Marriage Amendment.”
In the order Moore wrote “Confusion and uncertainty exist among the probate judges of this State as to the effect of Obergefell on the ‘existing orders’ in API. Many probate judges are issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples in accordance with Obergefell; others are issuing marriage licenses only to couples of the opposite gender or have ceased issuing all marriage licenses.”
Therefore, pursuant to his responsibility to “take any such other, further or additional action as may be necessary for the orderly administration of justice within the state,”
The order was applauded by Mat Staver of Liberty Counsel. Staver explained that “In Alabama and across America, state judiciaries and legislatures are standing up against the federal judiciary or anyone else who wants to come up with some cockeyed view that somehow the Constitution now births some newfound notion of same-sex marriage.”
“The opinion of five lawyers on the U.S. Supreme Court regarding same-sex marriage is lawless and without legal or historical support,”
The Alabama Supreme Court issued an order in March 2015 barring probate judges from issuing same-sex marriage licenses after a federal court in January of last year overturned Alabama’s voter-approved constitutional amendment defining marriage as one man and one woman,”