Federal judge rules against Kansas same-sex marriage ban
A federal judge issued an Election Day ruling against the ban on same-sex marriage in the state of Kansas.
U.S. District Court Judge Daniel Crabtree granted a preliminary injunction Tuesday barring Kansas officials from enforcing the state’s same-sex marriage ban or any other “Kansas statute, law, policy or practice that prohibits issuance of marriage licenses to same-sex couples in Kansas.”
Crabtree issued a temporary stay of his order until 5 p.m. central time on Nov. 11. That stay could be lifted sooner if the state does not seek a review by the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals.
The decision comes after a hearing in the case this past Friday. Kansas is one of the states in a circuit impacted by the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision last month declining to hear arguments in cases challenging same-sex marriage bans in five states — Utah, Oklahoma, Virginia, Indiana and Wisconsin — thus allowing lower court decisions legalizing marriage equality in those states to stand. Because the Supreme Court left intact rulings by the 4th Circuit, 7th Circuit and 10th Circuit Courts of Appeals striking down same-sex marriage bans in those five states, those appeals courts’ decisions applied to six other states in those three circuits: West Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Kansas, Colorado and Wyoming. Although some of those states have been quick to comply, Kansas has sought to defend the state’s same-sex marriage ban.
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