State Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore, who was ousted from his first chief justice post in 2003 after refusing to remove a Ten Commandments monument from the Alabama Judicial Building in Montgomery, wrote that his order on same-sex marriages is necessary to ensure justice in the state.
“Effective immediately, no Probate Judge of the State of Alabama nor any agent or employee of any Alabama Probate Judge shall issue or recognize a marriage license that is inconsistent” with the state code or constitution, Moore wrote in the Sunday order.
Section 30-1-19 of the state code states that “marriage is inherently a unique relationship between a man and a woman.”
‘I was shocked’
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King told CNN that his decision to obey the federal court’s orders was a clear-cut one.
“I am a rule-oriented person. We have to have rules and laws as part of an orderly society,” he said.
CNN’s Devon M. Sayers, John Branch, Deborah E. Bloom, Dave Alsup and Ariane de Vogue contributed to this report.
