The chief justice of Alabama's Supreme Court ordered the state's probate judges on Wednesday not to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples despite a ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court last year legalizing gαy marriage.

gαy marriage activists and legal experts assailed the order, arguing last June's landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision afforded same-sex couples the right to marry in all 50 states.

In a phone interview Chief Justice Roy Moore, who issued the order, said judges were bound by the state Supreme Court's decision last March halting same-sex marriage until that court determines the effect on the state of the national ruling.

A federal judge in Alabama overturned the state's ban on same-sex marriage last January.

"There is a great confusion out there as to what orders to obey," Moore said. "I’m not causing the confusion, I’m trying to clarify it."

Many probate judges were issuing marriage licenses to gαy and lesbian couples while others refused to do so, he said.

One probate judge, Steven Reed in Montgomery, Alabama, said his office would not heed the administrative order. "Judge Moore's latest charade is just sad & pathetic," Reed posted on Twitter.

But the Mobile County probate court said on its website that it would stop issuing marriage licenses to any applicants gαy or straight until further notice "to ensure full compliance with all court rulings."

The Southern Poverty Law Center, which has an ongoing ethics complaint against Moore, said he should be removed from the bench for telling the state's judges to enforce Alabama's ban on same-sex marriage.

"It’s a disgrace to his office that he occupies it," said Richard Cohen, president of the Alabama-based law center. Cohen said judges who follow Moore's order risked being held in contempt of court for violating the federal judge's ruling.

In Kentucky last year, County Clerk Kim Davis was jailed for five days after refusing to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples despite the U.S. Supreme Court ruling, making her a focal point in the U.S. gαy marriage debate.

Moore, a Republican, has been a hero of conservative causes before. In 2003, he was removed from office after a federal judge ruled he was placing himself above the law by refusing to take down a Ten Commandments monument.

He won the chief justice job back in a 2012 election, vowing not to do anything to create further friction with the federal courts.

http://news.yahoo.com/alabama-chief-justice-orders-halt-same-sex-marriage-002253547.html

This will be very interesting to watch from a legal perspective... supremacy clause and all that.

Yes, very interesting:

"It’s a disgrace to his office that he occupies it," said Richard Cohen, president of the Alabama-based law center.

Richard Cohen.  




This Jєω thinks it's disgraceful to oppose sodomy.  Lol.  

 Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore — ousted from office a decade ago when he refused to remove a Ten Commandments monument from state property — on Thursday stood by his assertion that Alabama probate judges should not issue marriage licenses to gαy couples, a seemingly direct challenge to a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that effectively legalized same-sex marriages nationwide.

Moore's stance first appeared on Wednesday in an administrative order; he reiterated his position Thursday in an interview with The Associated Press.

"Until further clarification, (the probate judges) are bound by state law," Moore said.

His order on Wednesday and his remarks on Thursday drew immediate condemnation from civil and gαy rights organizations and from a legal advocacy group, which filed a complaint against him with a state commission that investigates judicial misconduct. His critics promptly suggested that he should be removed from the bench again for his refusal to accept the U.S. Supreme Court's decision six months after it was handed down.

Some of the judges who stopped issuing licenses Wednesday immediately after Moore's order, meanwhile, resumed the service Thursday after consulting with attorneys.

In his order, Moore noted that the Alabama Supreme Court has not lifted a March 3 ruling prohibiting probate judges from issuing licenses to gαy couples. He said it's up to the state court to decide what to do with that order following the U.S. Supreme Court's decision.

Moore insisted Thursday that he is not defying the high court, but seeking to resolve what he says are lingering questions about the impact of the federal decision. He said he issued the order Wednesday because "there's a lot of confusion out there among probate judges about what to do."

"Some are issuing same-sex marriage licenses, some are not, some are issuing no marriage licenses at all."

Two federal prosecutors in Alabama, however, said on Wednesday that there should be no confusion, because the U.S. Supreme Court ruling trumps whatever the state court has to say on gαy marriage. Other Legal experts interviewed by the AP agreed.

Richard Cohen, president of the Montgomery-based legal advocacy group the Southern Poverty Law Center, said Moore should be removed from office — again.

"You know back in 2003 he was kicked out of office for violating a federal court order," Cohen said. "This time he's urging 68 probate judges to violate the federal court order that was entered by the district court in Mobile. He's also asking them to ignore the ruling of the United States Supreme Court."

The center — which sued Moore over the Ten Commandment monument — filed an ethics complaint to the state's judicial inquiry commission last year after Moore publicly criticized a federal judge's ruling overturning Alabama's same-sex marriage ban. The advocacy group filed a supplement to that complaint on Wednesday, saying Moore has violated the canons of judicial ethics by refusing to respect the U.S. Supreme Court's decision. The court has not acted on the earlier complaint filed by the SPLC.

Alabama Judicial Inquiry Commission Executive Director Jenny Garrett said she couldn't comment specifically on Moore, but that any potential sanctions for a judge accused of misconduct would be imposed if the commission filed charges in the court of the judiciary and the court found the judge to have committed ethics violations.

All proceedings before the commission are confidential and don't become public until they move to the court of the judiciary, Garrett said. Sanctions the court could impose on a judge include removal from office, suspension without pay, censure and more, Garrett said.

Wayne Flynt, a former Auburn University history professor, said Moore's tactics echo Southern states' resistance to federal school desegregation orders long after the segregation had been ruled illegal.

"We arbitrated these issues between 1861 and 1865," Flynt said of the cινιℓ ωαr conflict that determined who has the final say, states or the federal government.

Regardless of his stance, Moore's order did not appear to have widespread impact.

Probate judges in Lawrence and Madison counties who had stopped issuing all marriage licenses in response to Moore's order Wednesday said they had resumed the service Thursday after consulting with attorneys. Mobile County said licensing operations would resume on Friday.

http://news.yahoo.com/feds-alabama-judges-must-obey-us-supreme-court-163522535.html

He says he is not defying the Supreme Court.
 :roll-laugh1: :roll-laugh1: :roll-laugh1:

The title of this thread reveals the liberal mind of Poche. "gαy" is not the correct word to describe these people who engage in sins against the Lord and grotesque acts against the natural order. The proper term is pervert, sodomite, fag, fruit or homo. The word "gαy" was tactically stolen by the pervert fag community to give themselves a positive connotation. Instead of normal people viewing correctly that these people are perverts chained to this demonic and unnatural addiction, people view them as "bubbly", "happy" and "such nice people". The word "gαy" used by these fruits, and the Jєωs who pioneer this perversion among Gentiles, started this misguided perception.