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Alabama Supreme Court Justice calls same-sex marriage ruling 'tyranny'

An ethics complaint was filed against Alabama Justice Roy Moore within a day of the letter becoming public.

By Matt Bradwell
Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore. UPI /Greg Whitesell
Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore. UPI /Greg Whitesell | License Photo

MONTGOMERY, Ala., Jan. 28 (UPI) -- Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore wrote to Gov. Robert Bentley, urging him not to enforce a recent federal ruling overturning Alabama's constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage.

In the letter, Moore claims the District Court's ruling "raised serious, legitimate concerns about the propriety of federal court jurisdiction" and he even goes as far as to assert the ruling was an "unlawful opinion" and act of "tyranny."

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On Friday, U.S. District Judge Ginny Granade ruled Alabama's law banning same-sex marriage was unconstitutional and actually harmed the children its supporters attempted to frame their defense around.

"If anything, Alabama's prohibition of same-sex marriage detracts from its goal of promoting optimal environments for children," Granade wrote in her decision.

"Those children currently being raised by same-sex parents in Alabama are just as worthy of protection and recognition by the state as are the children being raised by opposite-sex parents. Yet Alabama's Sanctity laws harms the children of same-sex couples for the same reasons that the Supreme Court found that the Defense of Marriage Act harmed the children of same-sex couples."

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"The Supreme Court of Alabama has likewise described marriage as 'a divine institution,'" Moore disputes, "Imposing upon the parties 'higher moral and religious obligations than those imposed by any mere human institution and government.'"

Moore goes on to quote the 1885 Murphy v. Ramsey supreme court decision, in which the court ruled "the union for life of one man and one woman in the holy estate of matrimony ... is the source of all beneficent progress in social and political movement." Murphy v. Ramsey upheld the 1882 Edmunds Anti-Polygamy act, criminalizing the practice of having multiple wives. It makes no reference to same-sex marriage or homosexuality.

Moore then revisits his assertion that federal judicial rank constitutes "tyranny," citing an 1825 letter by Thomas Jefferson, in which the former president states his concern the federal government was growing too rapidly in the years following The War of 1812.

"'I see ... with the deepest affliction, the rapid strides which the federal branch of our government is advancing towards the usurpation of all the tights reserved to the States, and the consolidation in itself of all powers foreign and domestic; and that too, by constructions which, if legitimate, leave no limits to their power.'"

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Within a day of sending the letter to Bentley, civil rights group The Southern Poverty Law Center filed an ethics complaint against Moore with the Judicial Inquiry Commission of Alabama.

Outside of Alabama, Moore is known as the "Ten Commandments judge," who famously refused to remove the Judeo-Christian Ten Commandments from his court room in 2003. The SLPC also filed an ethics complaint against Moore at the time, and the Alabama Court of the Judiciary voted unanimously to revoke Moore's authority as Chief Justice. In 2012 Moore was re-elected to the position.

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