A state judge in Kansas has ordered Johnson County clerks to start issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples who want to marry, “[i]n the interest of justice and to avoid the uncertainty” that has arisen from federal court rulings.
Tenth Judicial District Judge Kevin P. Moriarty, appointed by former Gov. Kathleen Sebelius (D), issued his administrative order on Wednesday, citing the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals ruling which struck down Utah’s gay marriage ban. The Supreme Court allowed that decision to take effect on Monday. The appeals court jurisdiction covers Kansas, which means federal district court judges will be bound by it, but for now the state’s constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage remains in effect.
“That decision,” Moriarty wrote, “if applied to a case and controversy out of Kansas, would no doubt hold that under the federal Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses of the United States Constitution ‘those who wish to marry a person of the same sex are entitled to exercise the same fundamental right as is recognized for persons to wish to marry a person of the opposite sex.”
The judge noted that the 10th Circuit ruling stated that “similar statutory enactments” to the Utah gay marriage ban “do not withstand constitutional scrutiny.”
