Apparently, it's not over until it's over. The removal of the cohabitation law I wrote about yesterday may apply only to a few people in NC, not the whole state: Cohabitation law ruling doesn't apply statewide:
Legal experts said Friday that a Superior Court judge declaring a law that makes it a crime for unmarried couples to live together unconstitutional doesn't apply statewide.
Judge Ben Alford's ruling affects only those involved in the litigation: the Pender County Sheriff's Office, Pender County Sheriff Carson Smith, Ben David, the district attorney in Pender and New Hanover counties, and N.C. Attorney General Roy Cooper. A 1A story Friday reported that the judge's ruling applied statewide. But the ruling would have a statewide impact only if it were upheld on appeal.
The scholars say law enforcement officers and district attorneys elsewhere in the state still could prosecute couples living together out of wedlock.
"It's not until it gets up to the Court of Appeals that it applies statewide," said Dan Pollitt, a constitutional law professor at UNC-Chapel Hill.
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What also complicates the matter is that Alford has yet to sign a final order, which will include an injunction. What that injunction will say is still unknown, and the lawyers who are drafting the injunction will not talk about it.
"The official order has not yet been issued by the judge, so we really can't comment on the specifics of what it might or might not do," Jennifer Rudinger, state executive director of the ACLU, said in a statement Friday.
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