Lee Pulaski, lpulaski@wolfrivermedia.com
A federal judge in Wisconsin on Tuesday lifted her hold on an order allowing same-sex marriages to take place in Wisconsin.
Judge Barbara Crabb declared Wisconsin’s ban on gay marriage unconstitutional in June, but she put her ruling on hold a week later while the state appealed. The hold was set to expire as soon as the appeals ended.
That happened Monday, when the U.S. Supreme Court declined to review an appeals court decision upholding Crabb’s ruling.
Crabb said Tuesday that Wisconsin can no longer enforce its gay marriage ban.
The announcement came as welcome news to many same-sex couples, especially more than 500 couples that married in June before Crabb’s decision was put on hold.
Rejecting appeals from five states seeking to preserve their bans, the Supreme Court effectively made such marriages legal in 30 states, up from 19 and the District of Columbia.
Challenges are pending in the other 20 states.
Directly affected by Monday’s orders were Wisconsin, Indiana, Oklahoma, Utah and Virginia. Couples in six other states — Colorado, Kansas, North Carolina, South Carolina, West Virginia and Wyoming — should be able to get married in short order since those states would be bound by the same appellate rulings that have been on hold.
Jamey Spencer, of Shawano, was among the state residents eager to move forward with wedding plans and hopes to soon obtain a marriage license with his fiance, Ivan Machmueller. They’ve been together for nearly five years.
Spencer said Tuesday he was a little surprised at the Supreme Court’s decision not to hear the appeal and had expected it would be almost a year before Wisconsin’s case was resolved.
“I think that was the fastest resolution for it, instead of being in court for a really long time and having to hear all these arguments,” Spencer said. “They basically indicated they had better things to do than worry about who marries who.”
After Crabb stayed her decision, Spencer and Machmueller put wedding plans on hold, saying it made no sense to put down deposits for services when it wasn’t clear when or if they could be legally married.
“Now I’ve got to get busy,” Spencer said.
Shawano County Clerk Rosemary Rueckert said Tuesday that the county was making marriage licenses available to all couples.
“The ban against same-sex marriage has been deemed unconstitutional, so Shawano County will now be issuing the licenses,” Corporation Counsel Tony Kordus said. “Marriage licenses will be issued regardless of gender or the combination of genders.”
Couples will still have to go through the five-day waiting period, Rueckert said. Licenses cost $80.
Kordus noted that the county will be using the existing forms, which list the applicants as “bride” and “groom,” during the interim, but he didn’t believe the licenses would be disqualified by the state if a man’s name was listed under “bride” or a woman’s name was listed under “groom.”
“We’re hopeful they’ll update their forms quickly, but the fact that the form is inarticulate based on the current status of the law doesn’t mean we’re going to utilize that as a reason to get around following the law,” Kordus said.
Rueckert said she had one same-sex couple request a marriage license on Monday.