Roy Moore, chief justice of the Alabama Supreme Court from January 15, 2013 to April 26, 2017.

(CNSNews.com) -- Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore resigned from the bench on Wednesday and announced he is running for the U.S. Senate seat made vacant by Sen. Jeff Sessions' appointment as attorney general of the United States. The state's primaries are scheduled for Aug. 25 and the general election is Dec. 15.

In announcing his run, Justice Moore, a West Point graduate and veteran who served in Vietnam, said, “My position has always been God first, family, then country. I think I share and I know I share the vision of our president, Donald Trump, to make America Great Again."

"But, you know, before we can make America great again, we’ve got to make America good again," said Moore, who is known for his public statements in defense of Christianity, the Ten Commandments, and marriage between one man and one woman.

"Our first president in his Farewell Address said it, very simply, ‘virtue or morality is a necessary spring of popular government…. Who that is a sincere friend to it can look with indifference upon attempts to shake the foundation of the fabric?’" declared Moore.

“I know and I think you do too that the foundations of the fabric of our country are being shaken tremendously," said Moore, who is married and has four children (one adopted). "Our families are being crippled by divorce and abortion. Our sacred institution of marriage has been destroyed by the Supreme Court, and our rights and liberties are in jeopardy."

"And the Constitution we were sworn to uphold, since 1965 on the banks of the Hudson River at West Point, is being ignored by judges who have put themselves above the Constitution, by judges and justices of the United States Supreme Court who have ignored it," said Moore, who graduated from West Point in 1969.

"If we simply recognize what’s in the Constitution, we can return to a better government," he said. "Socialized medicine, Common Core education, they are not in the power of the federal government."

"As a United States senator, I will continue to stand for the rights and liberties not only of this state but of its people as well," said Moore. "I will defend those rights and liberties under the Constitution of the United States. So help me God. I thank you."