Box Turtle Bulletin

Alabama’s Roy Moore blusters some more

2015 was Alabama’s year in the spotlight.

On January 23, Judge Callie Granade found that Alabama’s anti-gay marriage ban violated the Equal Protections and Due Process provisions of the US Constitution. A few weeks later the Eleventh Circuit – and the US Supreme Court – denied stay on the ruling and marriages began.

On February 8, Alabama State Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore issued a pronouncement instructing the state’s probate judges to ignore the Federal Court ruling, the Eleventh Circuit’s response, and the refusal of stay by the Supreme Court of the United States and to instead deny marriage certificates to same-sex couples. He threatened to sic the governor on any who didn’t comply.

On February 10, Alabama Governor Robert Bentley (R) said he wasn’t playing that game. “I don’t want Alabama to be seen as it was 50 years ago when a federal law was defied. I’m not going to do that. I’m trying to move this state forward.”

Mobile County Probate Judge Don Davis felt that he was stuck between two ruling and didn’t want to defy either court. He requeste that the state Supreme Court “clarify” Moore’s pronouncement. They declined. Upon suit by Mobile county residents, Judge Granade ordered Davis to issue licenses.

Over the next month, probate judges in all but about a dozen counties began issuing licenses.

But on March 4, the Alabama State Supreme Court announced that the US Constitution’s Equal Protections and Due Process provisions do not provide equal protections for them sinning homosexuals.

As it has done for approximately two centuries, Alabama law allows for “marriage” only between one man and one woman. Alabama probate judges have a ministerial duty not to issue any marriage license contrary to this law. Nothing in the United States Constitution alters or overrides this duty.

The one exception was for Judge Davis, who had been specifically ordered by Grenade to issue licenses to four couples. They conceded that he could do that. Or, at least, he could tell them why they should let him do so.

Davis responded by requesting that be be exempt from the state ruling, but the Bama court wasn’t having it. They insisted he issue no more same-sex marriage licenses. Davis then turned to Judge Granade and requested that now that he had issued those licenses as ordered, he be allowed to deny future requests. Grenade also said no, he must comply with the US Constitution.

So, having been told that he cannot discriminate and that he must discriminate, Davis shut down the marriage license office in Mobile County to everyone.

Seeing that the state Supreme Court and several county judges were pretending to misunderstand Granade’s ruling and acting as though it only applied to four couples, marriage supporters appealed to make the case class action. On May 21, Granade agreed and applied her ruling to all 68 probate judges in the state. However, she stayed her ruling until the Supreme Court could rule on marriage equality (the case was already on their calendar).

On June 3, the state House voted to eliminate state marriage licenses altogether. But the next day the state Senate voted down that proposal.

On June 26, the US Supreme Court ruled in Obergefell v. Hodges that the fundamental right to marry is guaranteed to same-sex couples by both the Due Process Clause and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. On July 1, Granade clarified that her ruling now applied to all probate judges in Alabama (“by the language set forth in the order, the preliminary injunction is now in effect and binding on all members of the Defendant Class.”)

And same-sex marriages resumed in Alabama.

In September, the House again sought to eliminate marriage licenses, but again the Senate did not play along. So everything was assumed to be settled. Until today. (AL.com)

Chief Justice Roy Moore issued an order today saying that a ruling issued last March by the Alabama Supreme Court remains in effect and that probate judges “have a ministerial duty not to issue any marriage license contrary” to Alabama’s law and constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage.

In a four-page administrative order, Moore said the conflict between the state court ruling and the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in June has caused “confusion and uncertainty” among probate judges.

No. Most people know full well that federal rulings trump Moore’s opinions. There’s no confusion and no uncertainty.

But Moore is trying the same thing he did with Granade, claiming that the Supreme Court ruling applies only to the four states in that specific suit. Even though even the lowliest of junior clerks in Joe’s Law Shack and Auto Body Repair know that if SCOTUS doesn’t offer certiorari to a case, and if their ruling on related cases confirm the judge’s ruling, then that ruling stands.

Most counties will likely ignore Moore. But Judge Davis appears to have given up. (Buzzfeed)

Nonetheless, Moore’s move has stopped marriage licenses in at least one county. Mobile County Probate Judge Don Davis — who had been caught between the conflicting state and federal court orders last year — stopped issuing marriage licenses altogether on Wednesday afternoon.

“Well, we have closed,” Russell Davidson, a supervisor of the court’s division that handles marriage licenses, told BuzzFeed News. “At this time, we are not issuing any licenses until further notice.”

I suspect that won’t take long.