MONTGOMERY, Ala. – Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore’s defiance of federal court rulings on gay marriage violated judicial ethics, a disciplinary court ruled on Friday before suspending him for the rest of his term.
The punishment effectively removes Moore from office without the nine-member Alabama Court of the Judiciary officially ousting him. Given his age, he will not be able to run for chief justice again under state law.
FILE – In this Aug. 8, 2016 file photo, Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore speaks to the media during a news conference in Montgomery, Ala. Moore appeared before a judicial discipline panel Wednesday, Sept. 28, 2016, to answer accusations that he tried to block gay couples from marrying in the Deep South state. The outspoken Republican jurist could be removed from office for the second time in 13 years if the Court of the Judiciary finds he violated the state’s canons of judicial ethics. (AP Photo/Brynn Anderson, File) Moore was found to have encouraged probate judges to deny marriage licenses to gay couples six months after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that everyone has a fundamental right to marry in all 50 states.
Moore vehemently denied that his administrative order was an act of defiance and said his personal beliefs had nothing to do with it.
The same panel removed the outspoken Republican in 2003 because he refused to remove a Ten Commandments monument from the state judicial building. Voters later re-elected him as chief justice after he lost a race for governor.