WASHINGTON, DC — The religious conservative legal advocacy group, the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), is calling for state and local officials who are responsible for issuing marriage licenses in Maine, Maryland, and Washington state to abstain from personally issuing licenses to same-sex applicants, citing objections of faith or conscience.

Three legal memos advise municipal clerks in Maine, county clerks in Maryland, and county auditors in Washington that provisions in state law allow them to delegate responsibility to co-workers who don’t have “conscience-based objections” to issuing licenses to same-sex applicants.

“No American should be forced to give up a constitutionally protected freedom, nor should any American be forced to give up his or her job to maintain that freedom,” said Senior Counsel Austin R. Nimocks. “Religious freedom is paramount to every American, including those issuing marriage licenses. They can perform their job without violating their conscience.”

The memos also advise clerks or auditors who encounter resistance to contact ADF for legal assistance.

ADF (originally known as the Alliance Defense Fund) was founded in 1994 by a group of influential conservative ministers (including then-Coral Ridge Ministries senior pastor D. James Kennedy and James Dobson, founder of Focus on the Family), with the goal of “defending the right to hear and speak the Truth through strategy, training, funding, and litigation.”