Alabama Senate votes to abolish marriage licences
The State Senate in Alabama has voted to do away with marriage licences because it doesn’t want to give them to same-sex couples.
Inspired by the Supreme Court decision to legalise same-sex marriage, the chamber voted by 23-3 to pass the bill and send it to the lower house.
If passed, the new law would removing licences and replace them with a form. This would require couples – both gay and straight – to record their marriage, rather than the state issuing a licence.
A number of judges in the state have already stopped issuing licences altogether, in order to avoid giving them to same-sex couples. Republican Senator Greg Albritton said the change would stop this controversy and also allow couples to continue to marry.
“I’m just trying to find a way to solve the problem,” he said.
The only openly gay member of the State House, Representative Patricia Todd, said that the bill was unnecessary.
She demanded that judges “just do their job” and issue licences.
The bill will now be debated in the House of Representatives and will require to be approved by that chamber and signed into law by the Governor, before it can come into effect.
Earlier this month, the Supreme Court struck down a decision by the state’s Supreme Court to a mum who wanted to see her adopted kids.
