A lawsuit that seeks to force Arkansas to recognize the validity of state marriage licenses issued to same-sex couples has been assigned to a new judge, one who performed some of those weddings last year.
Document set
Gay marriage in Arkansas
- Marriage-license lawsuit order
- Opinion/concurrence on justices in gay-marriage case
- Maples motion to dismiss new case
- Leslie Rutledge brief on behalf of state
- Wagoner amended motion
- Chief Justice Jim Hannah recusal letter
- Justice Rhonda Wood recusal letter
- Justice Paul Danielson recusal
- Plaintiffs' response to request for second oral arguments
- Plaintiffs' motion for lifting of stay
- Legislative roll call — Motion to suspend rules
- Interim resolution in support of Amendment 83
- Arkansas Supreme Court stays judge's gay-marriage ruling pending appeal
- Plaintiffs respond to state's request for stay
- McDaniel again asks Supreme Court for stay of gay-marriage ruling
- Judge Piazza May 15 final order on gay marriage bans
- Order denying defendants' motion for immediate stay
- Gay-marriage case plaintiffs' motion for clarification of judgment
- Piazza final order on gay marriage nunc pro tunc
- Piazza notice to attorneys of clarified order
- Court declines stay of gay-marriage ruling
- Piazza strikes down Arkansas' same-sex marriage ban
The 3-month-old lawsuit had been assigned to Pulaski County Circuit Judge Alice Gray, but she recused without explanation Friday, and the case was randomly transferred to Circuit Judge Wendell Griffen.
State lawyers who are challenging the lawsuit say the marriage licenses granted to same-sex couples aren't valid because they were issued illegally.
They've asked that the case either be dismissed because the courts don't have the authority to do what the plaintiffs are asking or put on hold until a higher court can decide the legality of same-sex marriage.
Griffen performed some same-sex marriages in the Pulaski County Courthouse during the six-day period last year in which three counties recognized the ruling of another Pulaski County circuit judge, Chris Piazza, that Arkansas' bans on gay marriage were unconstitutional.
Griffen told The Associated Press he married three couples in the first hour after the clerk's office began issuing licenses.
"It's the right thing to do. I am a minister. I am a judge. I am ordained to celebrate commitments in marriages, and I have believed for a long time that my faith compels," Griffen told the news agency. "This is the love of God joining with the love of people."
The plaintiffs -- two couples and a widower -- in the ongoing suit had asked Gray to transfer their case to Piazza, arguing that he should preside over their case because it involves many of the same legal issues he considered in his May 2014 ruling against the gay-marriage ban. According to a petition filed in April, such a move would eliminate the plaintiffs' need to call Piazza as a witness.
They sued in February to force the state Department of Finance and Administration and the Health Department to recognize the validity of their licenses for purposes of filing joint tax returns, acquiring health insurance and receiving spousal Social Security benefits.
Clerks in Carroll, Pulaski and Washington counties issued marriage licenses beginning May 10, 2014 -- the day after Piazza's ruling -- through May 16, 2014, when the Arkansas Supreme Court took over the case and stayed his decision. Piazza's decision ended 10 months of litigation challenging the validity of Arkansas' gay-marriage ban.
That case has been on appeal for more than a year. The high court heard oral arguments six months ago in November and spent seven weeks accepting arguments from the sides about which of the justices should decide the case.
Metro on 05/27/2015