Roy Moore's Last Stand

by JASmius



The Alabama Chief Justice has chosen the hill on which he will, (hopefully just) professionally speaking, almost certainly die.

But that "death" will without question be as a martyr for a just and righteous cause:

Alabama’s highest judge, State Supreme Court [Chief] Justice Roy Moore, openly declared war against the ruling, going so far as to tell Alabama probate judges they need to ignore the ruling because the federal judge had no authority to redefine marriage in opposition of the Alabama constitution.

“It’s my duty to speak up when I see the jurisdiction of our courts being intruded by unlawful federal authority,” Moore said. And he hasn’t stopped there. Moore is now running the national media circuit to stand by his defiance of the federal court’s judicial tyranny and is claiming the ruling does not apply. Moore says the federal judge ruling was simply an opinion ruling on the case before the court at the time, and the ruling does not apply to anyone who was not a defendant in the case. As a result, according to Moore, none of Alabama’s probate judges are bound by the federal court ruling.

Moore says that because the SCOTUS chose to “stay” v[ersu]s rule on the case, the Alabama constitution and State Supreme Court are still the ultimate authority on the matter. “She has no control over the state of Alabama to force all probate judges to do anything,” Moore said. “This is a case of dual sovereignty of federal and state authorities. The United States Supreme Court is very clear in recognizing that federal courts do not bind state courts.”

Regrettably, Chief Justice Moore is half right and half wrong.  U.S. District Court Judge Callie Granade does, indeed, not have any legal authority to dictate "official" marriage definitions to the State of Alabama in blatant contravention of the 81%-19% voter-passed 2006 referendum.  But she most certainly does have the raw federal power to do so, and thus indubitably does have "control over the state of Alabama to force all probate judges to do" whatever she wants.  Which is why Chief Justice Moore is having to take this last stand - one that, as we have already chronicled, he is destined to lose.

But as Dylan Thomas once wrote, "Do not go gentle into that good night; rage, rage, against the dying of the light."  Or, as the corresponding adage teaches, "Better to die on one's feet than live on one's knees".  Which, in the immediate context, has a whole additional connotation.