TENNESSEE: Haters File Second Lawsuit Intended To “Nullify” Supreme Court’s Ruling On Same-Sex Marriage

Former Tennessee state Sen. David Fowler, now head of his state’s Family Action Council, has filed a lawsuit against a second county clerk which intends to nullify the Supreme Court’s Obergefell ruling. Fowler’s first such suit came two weeks ago. The Times-Free Press reports:

Bradley County Commissioner Howard Thompson and a local pastor have filed a lawsuit to stop the county from issuing marriage licenses and to have the state’s marriage license law declared invalid in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling allowing same-sex marriage. The suit was filed Thursday in Bradley County Circuit Court by attorney and conservative former state senator David Fowler, with the Constitutional Government Defense Fund.

Since the Tennessee General Assembly has not adopted new laws, the suit states, no valid marriage licenses can be issued. Anyone who performs a marriage can’t return a signed license to the county clerk, and failing to do so is a misdemeanor. Anyone who marries a couple considered “not capable” of being married can be charged with a misdemeanor and fined up to $500 — and lack of a valid license means no couple is capable, the suit states.

“Given the civil and criminal penalties to which those who can solemnize marriages are subject if they do not comply with the law, it is quite understandable that they would want to know if they are still authorized to solemnize marriages if the law is ‘invalid,’ as the Supreme Court clearly held,” Fowler said in the news release.

Plaintiffs in the first suit include a deranged local anti-LGBT activist who has written a book which advises Christian parents to beat their children. Last month a Tennessee House subcommittee failed to advance a bill that would nullify Obergefell statewide.