2:44Paula Faris interviews Kim Davis, the Kentucky court clerk who spent time in jail for her refusal to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples. Ida Mae Astute/Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty Images
A decade after the Supreme Court granted marriage rights to same-sex couples across the country, the justices will this fall consider for the first time whether to hear a case explicitly challenging that ruling.
Kim Davis, the former county clerk from Kentucky who was incarcerated for six days in 2015 after refusing to issue marriage licenses to a same-sex couple on religious grounds, is contesting a jury verdict of $100,000 for emotional damages along with $260,000 for legal fees.
In a petition for writ of certiorari submitted last month, Davis asserts that the First Amendment’s guarantee of free exercise of religion protects her from personal liability concerning the refusal to issue marriage licenses.
More fundamentally, she contends that the Supreme Court’s ruling in Obergefell v Hodges — which expanded marriage rights for same-sex couples under the 14th Amendment’s due process guarantees — was “outrageously incorrect.”
"This error needs to be rectified," wrote Davis’ attorney Mathew Staver in the petition. He refers to Justice Anthony Kennedy’s majority opinion in Obergefell as “legal fiction.”
This petition seems to be the first occasion since 2015 that the court has been formally requested to reverse the landmark marriage ruling. Davis is viewed as one of the few Americans who currently possess legal standing to challenge this precedent.
Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis, accompanied by her son Nathan Davis, a deputy clerk, addresses the media outside the Rowan County Courthouse in Morehead, Ky., on September 14, 2015. Pablo Alcala/Lexington Herald-Leader/Tribune News Service via Getty Image
"If there ever was a case of extraordinary significance," Staver stated, "the first individual in the Republic’s history who faced jail time for adhering to her religious beliefs regarding the traditional definition of marriage, this should be it."
Lower courts have dismissed Davis’ claims, and most legal experts view her appeal as a long shot. A federal appeals court panel determined earlier this year that the former clerk “cannot invoke the First Amendment as a defense because she is being held accountable for state action, which the First Amendment does not shield.”
In her role as Rowan County Clerk in 2015, Davis was the only official responsible for issuing marriage licenses on behalf of the state.
Justices of the US Supreme Court pose for their official photo at the Supreme Court in Washington, DC on October 7, 2022. Olivier Douliery/AFP via Getty Images
"Not a single judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals expressed any interest in Davis’s rehearing petition, and we are confident that the Supreme Court will similarly agree that her arguments do not warrant further consideration," stated William Powell, attorney for David Ermold and David Moore, the now-married Kentucky couple that brought the lawsuit against Davis for damages, in a statement to ABC News.
A renewed effort to reverse legal precedent
Davis’ appeal to the Supreme Court coincides with conservative adversaries of marriage rights for same-sex couples launching a renewed effort to overturn existing legal precedents and permit each state to establish its own policies.
At the time Obergefell was ruled in 2015, 35 states had statutory or constitutional prohibitions against same-sex marriages, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Only eight states had enacted laws specifically allowing such unions.
As of 2025, at least nine states have either proposed legislation aimed at preventing new marriage licenses for LGBTQ individuals or passed resolutions urging the Supreme Court to reverse Obergefell
Sourse: abcnews.go.com
