Just days before a federal judge's Thursday ruling cleared the way for same-sex marriage in Florida, at least five counties decided that they will no longer conduct courthouse weddings in their jurisdictions.
Starting in the new year, Duval, Santa Rosa, Okaloosa, Baker and Clay Counties will stop offering this service, according to the Florida Times-Union.
The clerks in all of the counties said multiple factors led to their decisions to stop holding courthouse weddings, but the debate over gay marriage is reportedly among the primary reasons.
Had the counties not changed the rules and ended all marriages, clerks would have potentially been forced to comply with any ruling in favor of same-sex marriage, according to the Times-Union.
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"It was decided as a team, as an office, this would be what we do so that there wouldn’t be any discrimination," Duval Clerk Ronnie Fussell told the outlet, citing his staffers' concerns over conducting gay matrimonies. "The easiest way is to not do them at all."
Fussell, who is a Christian, told the outlet that he favors protections for gays and lesbians, but that he does not support same-sex matrimony.
Marriage, he said, should be defined as being between one man and one woman.
"Personally it would go against my beliefs to perform a ceremony that is other than that," he told the Times-Union.
According to Florida's Daily News, Okaloosa County will join the other counties in no longer performing marriages. County Clery J.D. Peacock told the outlet in a statement that ceremonies will end starting January 1, citing controversy over same-sex marriage in the state.
"First, and most importantly I do not want to have members of our team put in a conflict between their personal religious beliefs and the implementation of a societal philosophy issue," he said in the statement.
AP
Santa Rosa County, too, issued a similar announcement last month, according to the Christian Post.
These moves came just days before U.S. District Judge Robert L. Hinkle issued a ruling Thursday that will lead to gay marriage licenses being issued in the state come next Tuesday. That ruling, according to the Miami Herald, instructs Florida clerks not to enforce the state's ban on gay marriage.
In fact, Hinkle wrote that "the Constitution requires the Clerk to issue such licenses."
Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi previously appealed a previous ruling from Hinkle in August that found the state's ban on gay matrimonies unconstitutional; it is currently unclear whether that legal battle will continue.
Read more about the Florida marriage debate here.
(H/T: Christian Post)
