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Bethan McKernan
Jun 27, 2015
Talk about cutting off your nose to spite your face.
In what seems like an ill-advised protest, at least three counties in the southern state of Alabama have stopped issuing marriage licences after a landmark Supreme Court decision on Friday overturning all same-sex marriage bans.
It can't possibly be discrimination if you're refusing to marry everyone, right? Right?!
Geneva County probate judge Fred Hamic said under Alabama law he had the right to refuse to issue marriage licences. In a statement to the Dothan Eagle he said:
Section 30-1-9 of the Alabama Code of 1975 says a probate judge may issue a marriage licence... It doesn’t say a probate judge has to issue a marriage licence...
I will not be doing any more ceremonies.
Pike County probate judge Wes Allen stopped issuing licences to both gay and straight couples back in February as a means of preventing gay marriage. He told AP he was "saddened" by the Supreme Court's decision.
My office discontinued issuing marriage licences in February and I have no plans to put Pike County back into the marriage business. The policy of my office regarding marriage is no different today than it was yesterday.
Alabama briefly married gay couples after the federal Supreme Court declared it constitutional in 2013 but stopped after the state's Supreme Court stepped in and ordered it to cease.
Let's see how long some of these judges can bury their head in the sand.
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