Kentucky's new governor has ordered county clerks' names removed from state marriage licence forms at the centre of a controversy involving a clerk who was jailed after refusing to issue licences to gay couples.
Governor Matt Bevin had said shortly after his election in November, as only the second Republican governor of Kentucky since 1971, that he would change the forms that had drawn objections from Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis and some other clerks.
"To ensure that the sincerely held religious beliefs of all Kentuckians are honoured, I took action to revise the clerk marriage licence form," Bevin said on Tuesday in a statement.
It was unclear what effect his executive order would have on Davis' case.
She made headlines by refusing to issue marriage licences to gay and lesbian couples, even after the US Supreme Court in June legalised same-sex matrimony across the United States.
Officials with the American Civil Liberties Union, representing couples who had sued Davis, said Bevin's move only "added to the cloud of uncertainty that hangs over marriage licences in Kentucky", as clerk names are required by state law to appear on the licences.
Mat Staver, a lawyer for Davis, called the governor's action "a wonderful Christmas gift" allowing the county clerk to celebrate the holidays without having to choose between her faith and her job.
Davis took steps to remove her name and office from the forms after she was released from jail, and a deputy clerk has issued licences on her behalf.
Davis repeatedly urged then-Governor Steve Beshear, a Democrat, to remove clerk names from the form or provide other relief so she would not violate her religious beliefs.
She has also appealed Bunning's orders to the 6th US Circuit Court of Appeals. Bunning and the appeals court have repeatedly denied her stays in the case.
Beshear had said he had no authority to relieve county clerks of their statutory duties by executive order and that the state legislature could address the issue.
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