SC Nixes Call to Overturn Its Decision Legalizing Same-Sex Marriage

The Supreme Court has rejected a call to overturn its landmark decision that legalized same-sex marriage nationwide, Mark Sherman reported for the Associated Press (AP).

Justice Clarence Thomas has called for reversing the same-sex marriage ruling.

The justices, without comment, turned away an appeal from Kim Davis, the former Kentucky court clerk who refused to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples after the high court’s 2015 ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges. 

Davis had sought to overturn a lower-court order requiring her to pay $360,000 in damages and attorney’s fees to a couple denied a marriage license.

Her lawyers repeatedly invoked the words of Justice Clarence Thomas, who alone among the nine justices has called for reversing the same-sex marriage ruling. Thomas was among the four dissenting justices in 2015.

Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito are the other dissenters who remain on the court today.

Roberts has been silent on the subject since writing a dissenting opinion in the case. Alito has continued to criticize the decision, though he said recently he was not advocating that it be overturned.