{"id":138881,"date":"2019-05-25T12:43:14","date_gmt":"2019-05-25T18:43:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/?p=138881"},"modified":"2019-05-25T12:43:14","modified_gmt":"2019-05-25T18:43:14","slug":"the-end-of-marriage-in-alabama-not-really","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2019\/05\/25\/the-end-of-marriage-in-alabama-not-really.html","title":{"rendered":"The End of Marriage in Alabama (not really)"},"content":{"rendered":"<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Alabama is ending state marriage licenses and ceremony requirements. File an affidavit and you&#39;re hitched. Apparently a way to keep some judges from getting pissy about having to issue same-sex marriage licenses, but whatever. <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/fa7mfaiVwY\">https:\/\/t.co\/fa7mfaiVwY<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; ***Dave Hill (@Three_Star_Dave) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Three_Star_Dave\/status\/1131943302998253570?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">May 24, 2019<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Alabama is ending state marriage licenses and ceremony requirements. File an affidavit and you&#8217;re hitched. Apparently a way to keep some judges from getting pissy about having to issue same-sex marriage licenses, but whatever.<br \/>\nhttps:\/\/t.co\/fa7mfaiVwY<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>So this is kind of interesting. Alabama has been still struggling with government workers &#8212; probate judges in particular &#8212; refusing to sign marriage licenses for same-sex couples, even though it&#8217;s been established as\u00a0 completely legal. Somehow they feel they are going to get sodomy cooties or something by &#8220;participating&#8221; in a marriage between two people of the same gender, even though there&#8217;s no sign that they do any similar vetting of all the other marriages they are willing to sign off on.<\/p>\n<p>(Judicial signing of a marriage license indicates that it is a lawful marriage, not necessarily a moral one or praiseworthy one or attractive one or one that meets one&#8217;s interpretation of God&#8217;s approval. If the latter were the case, I would expect a whole lot fewer marriages, and a lot less patience for judges.)<\/p>\n<p>Current Alabama law only says that a judge\u00a0<em>may<\/em> sign licenses, so county probate judges who object to gay folk getting married have been refusing to sign\u00a0<em>any<\/em> licenses, meaning people are sometimes forced to drive to another county to get their paperwork done, regardless of their sexual orientation.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_134718\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-134718\" style=\"width: 644px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/wedding+cake+lesbians.jpgimgmax=660.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-134718 size-full\" title=\"weddingcakelesbians.jpgimgmax660\" src=\"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/wedding+cake+lesbians.jpgimgmax=660.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"644\" height=\"483\" srcset=\"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/wedding+cake+lesbians.jpgimgmax=660.jpg 644w, https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/wedding+cake+lesbians.jpgimgmax=660-150x113.jpg 150w, https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/wedding+cake+lesbians.jpgimgmax=660-300x225.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 984px) 61vw, (max-width: 1362px) 45vw, 600px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-134718\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Ew! Gay wedding cake cooties!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Rather than telling people to do their job or get fired for it, Alabama is pulling an end run: they&#8217;re getting rid of marriage licenses and compulsory marriage ceremonies altogether. Now nobody has to &#8220;sign off&#8221; on a marriage except the participants.<\/p>\n<p>That&#8217;s actually not a bad thing, even if it&#8217;s for, um, dubious reasons. Couples wanting to marry will now need only sign an affidavit that they are legal to do so. Zip-zoom, you may kiss your partner. No judges required to sign on the license. No officiant &#8220;solemnizing&#8221; and signing off that they witnessed the ceremony as an official witness. Like any other legal contract (which, from the perspective of the state, marriage is), the participants sign on the dotted line and it&#8217;s done.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s expected most folk will still want a wedding ceremony of some sort &#8212; gloom and doom predictions about the death of the marriage industry in Alabama seem wildly exaggerated to me. And now those probate judges who don&#8217;t want to sully their fingers dealing with Those People and Their Unholy Alliances (at least until there are wills to be probated) can remain ritually pure and pretend to virtue.<\/p>\n<p><em>Would you like to know more?<\/em><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.al.com\/news\/2019\/05\/alabama-lawmakers-pass-bill-to-end-marriage-licenses.html\">Alabama lawmakers pass bill to end marriage licenses &#8211; al.com<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/politics\/2019\/05\/25\/alabama-legislature-makes-same-sex-marriage-easier-by-passing-law-ending-license-requirement\/?utm_term=.c98b9ab2891a\">Alabama legislature makes same-sex marriage easier by passing law ending license requirement &#8211; The Washington Post<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.al.com\/news\/2019\/05\/marriage-licenses-end-in-alabama-whats-next-what-it-means-if-youre-getting-married.html\">Marriage licenses end in Alabama? What\u2019s next, what it means if you\u2019re getting married &#8211; al.com<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Dropping most state marriage paperwork is a good thing for sketchy reasons.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":21368,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[78,109,350,25,718],"tags":[1251,1855,723,1856],"class_list":["post-138881","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-tweets","category-church-state","category-civil-liberties","category-gay-stuff","category-marriage-equality","tag-lgbt","tag-marriage-equality","tag-nt","tag-religious-freedom"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/06\/wedding-rings2.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":49740,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2015\/03\/04\/alabama-supreme-court-longs-for-the-50s-the-1850s.html","url_meta":{"origin":138881,"position":0},"title":"Alabama Supreme Court longs for the 50s. The 1850s","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 4-Mar-15 6:26am","format":false,"excerpt":"\"Federal court rulings? We don't need no stinking federal court rulings!\" Because state nullification worked so well last time.And for such (pardon me) bullshit rationales:The Alabama court ruled state bans on gay marriage aren't discriminatory since they ban both men and women from marrying people of the same sex, and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;~PlusPosts&quot;","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":128263,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2015\/10\/09\/because-separate-but-equal-is-such-a-keen-idea.html","url_meta":{"origin":138881,"position":1},"title":"Because &quot;separate but equal&quot; is such a keen idea","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 9-Oct-15 7:09am","format":false,"excerpt":"An Alabama judge thinks that since the federal government is the one mandating same-sex marriage, they should be the one licensing and performing such marriages, not state and county officials.Judge Enslen appears to have skipped class when \"separate but equal\" treatment of groups during the civil rights era was put\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;~PlusPosts&quot;","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":51341,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2015\/06\/02\/alabama-tries-to-be-oh-so-tricksy-to-keep-banning-gay-marriage.html","url_meta":{"origin":138881,"position":2},"title":"Alabama tries to be oh-so-tricksy to keep banning gay marriage","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 2-Jun-15 2:34pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Faced with the prospect of an unfavorable SCOTUS ruling this month, the Alabama legislature thinks it has found the perfect tricksy way of foiling those dastardly justices.They're getting rid of marriage licenses.Instead, couples (and an officiant) would sign a contract and file it with the state. One of the clauses\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;~PlusPosts&quot;","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":45668,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2014\/10\/06\/not-with-a-bang-but-a-refusal-to-take-up-an-appeal.html","url_meta":{"origin":138881,"position":3},"title":"Not with a bang, but a refusal to take up an appeal","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 6-Oct-14 11:42am","format":false,"excerpt":"The Supreme Court has declined to hear appeals against those federal circuit courts who have declared a ban on gay marriage to be unconstitutional. Which means the states covered in those circuits -- including Colorado (http:\/\/www.slate.com\/blogs\/outward\/2014\/10\/06\/the_supreme_court_actually_just_allowed_gay_marriage_in_eleven_11_states.html for more) have to abide by those circuit court decisions.It's an oddly quiet way\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;~PlusPosts&quot;","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":49358,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2015\/01\/25\/marriage-license-shenanigans-in-oklahoma.html","url_meta":{"origin":138881,"position":4},"title":"Marriage license shenanigans in Oklahoma","author":"***Dave","date":"Sun 25-Jan-15 11:22pm","format":false,"excerpt":"It's been suggested that one possible (and appropriate) outcome of the controversy over marriage equality would be to get the state out of the business of marriage. Let the state recognize some sort of licensed civil union, and let folk who want a religious state of \"Holy Matrimony\" arrange that\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;~PlusPosts&quot;","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":52017,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2015\/08\/01\/if-non-equality-county-clerks-are-conscientious-objectors-treat-them-as-such.html","url_meta":{"origin":138881,"position":5},"title":"If non-equality county clerks are conscientious objectors, treat them as such","author":"***Dave","date":"Sat 1-Aug-15 1:38pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Attorneys from Liberty Counsel for Kim Davis, the Kentucky county clerk who refuses to issue marriage licenses to gay couples, claim she is like a conscientious objector in wartime. '\u201cLike a noncombatant who cannot shoulder a rifle, a county clerk who cannot issue\u201d same-sex licenses \u201ccan still faithfully and devotedly\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;~PlusPosts&quot;","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138881","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=138881"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138881\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":138909,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138881\/revisions\/138909"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21368"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=138881"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=138881"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=138881"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}