Alabama starts same sex marriages in messy patchwork

By John Mack Freeman

The state of Alabama started issuing same sex marriage licenses this week, but the process was anything but smooth. Due to conflicting instructions from the federal court judge and the Chief Justice of the Alabama Supreme Court, many probate judges were unsure as to what they were legally empowered to do. At the beginning of the week, only a handful of counties were issuing marriage licenses to all couples. A few more counties issued licenses only to male/female couples. But most counties stopped issuing licenses altogether for a few days.

The situation has gotten better over the last few days. The federal court has clarified its decision, stating that it applied to the entire state (obviously), and that all counties should be issuing these licenses. It also pointed out that the federal court and the Supreme Court of the United States trumps the opinion of the state court. Since that time, more counties have started to follow the law. Via Joe My God:

As of mid-day yesterday at least 51 of Alabama’s 67 counties had begun issuing same-sex marriage licenses. Seven of the holdout counties are issuing licenses to opposite sex couples only and the rest are not issuing licenses at all. About half of the counties now obeying the law began doing so after federal Judge Ginny Granade’s Thursday order against Mobile County. Same-sex licenses are currently available to at least 86% of Alabama’s population.

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