The Alabama Judicial Inquiry Commission on Friday responded to suspended Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore's efforts to have the judicial ethics charges against him dismissed.

Instead of dismissing the charges, the Alabama Court of the Judiciary should issue a summary judgment in its favor and remove Moore now from the bench, the JIC states in its response.

"This court (COJ) can conclude this matter now, deny the Chief Justice's motion for summary judgment, enter judgment as a matter of law in favor of the commission (JIC), remove the Chief Justice from judicial office, and reaffirm Alabama's fidelity to the rule of law," the JIC motion states.

The charges filed by the JIC surround Moore's administrative order in January to Alabama probate judges stating that last year's Alabama Supreme Court Order telling them not to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples was still in place despite later rulings by the U.S. Supreme Court and other federal courts that declared it legal.

"The Chief Justice's January 6th order and his conduct surrounding it has once again created an atmosphere in which Alabama's subordinate judges - and by extension, the public itself - have been encouraged to show disregard for a binding federal injunctions and clear federal law," according to the JIC's response Friday. "It also represents a blatant abuse of his (Moore's) administrative authority, one which placed his impartiality into question on a matter pending before the entire Alabama Supreme Court."

"These actions alone and taken in concert violate the Alabama Canons of Judicial Ethics," the JIC states.

The JIC, in its response filed with the Alabama Court of the Judiciary (COJ) which is slated to hear the charges, also states that Moore has never expressed remorse for the impact of his actions on the state's judicial system, but rather has continued to engage in "systematic gamesmanship" to convince the COJ that he never advised defiance of the federal courts. But Moore's attorney with Liberty Counsel, has mounted an aggressive public relations campaign about "standing up to the federal judiciary," the JIC states.

The JIC also stated that judges have been removed in other states for far less and also cited Moore's ouster by the COJ in 2003 when he refused a federal court order to remove the Ten Commandments monument from the state judicial building.

"The Chief Justice has made good on his promise of many years ago, and his continued flouting of our system of constitutional justice regrettably leaves this court (COJ) only one suitable response. This court must remove Chief Justice Moore from office."

On June 27 the chief judge of the Court of the Judiciary, Mike Joiner, granted Moore's request to have his motion to dismiss the charges heard at a hearing by the full nine-member court. He set that hearing for Aug. 8. After that hearing a final hearing, including a trial if necessary, would be set.

Joiner also gave the Judicial Inquiry Commission until Friday to file any brief and materials opposing Moore's motion for summary judgment and dismissal and any other related motion. Moore now has until July 22 to file any responses to Friday's response by the JIC.

The JIC charges center on Moore's alleged violation of judicial ethics when in January he advised probate judges in the state that the Alabama Supreme Court's order from March 2015 telling them not to issue same-sex marriage licenses was still in effect, despite the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling three months later making same-sex marriage legal nationwide.

Liberty Counsel, the group that represents Moore, in late May filed the federal lawsuit against the JIC, asking among other things that the law that automatically suspends a judge when charged by JIC be declared unconstitutional.

The JIC filed a motion seeking to have that federal lawsuit dismissed.

Moore on Monday filed a response seeking to have U.S. District Court Judge W. Harold Albritton, III deny that request. Moore states that judges should be given due process before suspension.

"Whether the Chief Justice can fulfill the duties and responsibilities that the citizens of Alabama elected him to fulfill during the pendency of the COJ proceedings will have no effect, direct or indirect, upon the course of those proceedings," Moore states in his reply to JIC in federal court. "The requirement that Alabama provide a judge with due process before imposing a suspension from office neither interferes with the current proceeding in the COJ nor requires this Court to supervise any future proceeding."

Albritton has set a hearing for Aug. 4 for oral arguments on the JIC's motion to dismiss the lawsuit.

If removed from the bench by the Court of the Judiciary, it would be the second time Moore was removed by that court after charges. The first time was in 2003 after Moore refused a federal court order to remove a Ten Commandments monument from the Alabama Supreme Court building.

Friday's response by the JIC was filed by the commission's attorneys John L. Carrol, Rosa Hamlett Davis, and R. Ashby Pate, an attorney with Lightfoot Franklin White LLC in Birmingham.