Alabama Might Get Rid of Marriage Licenses to Protect Homophobic Judges
Lawmakers in Alabama are considering scrapping marriage licenses altogether in a move designed to protect and placate homophobic judges statewide.
Senate Bill 69, introduced by Republican state Sen. Greg Albritton, would remove the need for marriage licenses to affirm a couple's nuptials. Local judges could still choose to issue marriage licenses to newlyweds; however, the paperwork would no longer be mandated, and couples would instead receive documentation that looks more like a legal contract.
According to NBC News, Albritton, a Christian who considers himself a "traditionalist," sees the bill as a way of "[finding] a way to comply with the law" without compromising his religious convictions.
"The law" he's referring to is a Supreme Court decision from 2015 that made marriage equality the law of the land across the United States.
SB 69 mirrors actions taken by lawmakers in Kentucky after Kim Davis, Rowan County's infamously homophobic clerk, refused to issue a marriage license to a same-sex couple after the Supreme Court's marriage equality ruling. Davis's case was later dismissed, and Kentucky's governor signed a bill into law nixing the need for county clerks to sign off on marriage licenses.
Albritton, a 67-year-old who's served in Alabama's Senate since 2010, insists that his goal is to "find a means with the least amount of trouble with the greatest possibility of consensus ... without making anybody mad.”
“It doesn’t hurt anybody, it doesn’t hurt anything, it doesn't hurt the institution,” he told NBC News. “If you want a ceremony, you can have a ceremony, any type of ceremony you choose, but it won’t affect the legality of the marriage.”
The bill passed through the state Senate last week.
Meanwhile, writers for other outlets, including New York Magazine, likened Albritton's proposal to strategies by racist Southerns in the '50s and '60s, who posited getting rid of public schools instead of complying with the nationwide push for desegregation. Today's example is less extreme, perhaps, but it's quite the parallel.
