On Tuesday night, the Alabama Supreme Court ruled, 7-1, to bar state probate judges from issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples. The order is a direct violation of several orders by U.S. District Judge Callie Granade, allowed to take effect by the U.S. Supreme Court. The justices also issued a lengthy defense of defining marriage as between one man and one woman. Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore sat out the vote, but the six-justice majority asserted in its unsigned ruling that the state court could "interpret the United States Constitution independently from, and even contrary to, federal courts." One judge on the all-Republican court partially assented, and Justice James Gregory Shaw was the lone dissenter, warning his colleagues that they are overstepping their authority and "and potentially unsettling established principles of law." Since Moore originally ordered the probate judges to disregard Judge Granade's ruling, Alabama has been a confusing jumble of marriage law.