Judge Irvin Condon has issued the first same-sex marriage licenses in South Carolina.

Early Wednesday, according to The Associated Press, the office of Probate Judge Irvin Condon in Charleston said that he had already issued six licenses to same-sex couples.

The judge's attorney, John Nichols, says the path for issuing the licenses was cleared by a decision made in a case in Columbia.

On Tuesday, the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals declined to stay a district court ruling from last week that struck down South Carolina's gay marriage ban.

Following this decision, South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson, a Republican, said in a statement that his office would ask the U.S. Supreme Court to stay the district court's ruling, assuring that the "issue has not yet been resolved nationally," and that Tuesday’s ruling by the Fourth Circuit “does not end the constitutional obligation of this Office to defend South Carolina law.”

Last month, the South Carolina Supreme Court told probate judges not to issue any marriage licenses until there was a decision in that case.

Nichols says Tuesday's ruling was that decision, so Judge Condon is issuing licenses.

On Wednesday, Judge Richard Gergel of Federal District Court struck down South Carolina’s ban on same sex marriage as unconstitutional. He gave the state a week to appeal to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, in Richmond, Virginia. With the ban lifted, South Carolina would become the 34th state to allow gay marriage.

Colleen Condon, a plaintiff in the South Carolina case who was denied a marriage license in Charleston last month, said in a Tuesday statement that she and her fiancée were looking forward to their union, explaining how ecstatic they felt as they prepared to go pick up their marriage license, Reuters reported.

Judge Irvin Condon is a distant cousin to Colleen Condon.

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