Natalie DiBlasio

USA TODAY

Michigan issued its first gay marriage license to a couple in Ingham County on Saturday, just a day after the state's ban on same-sex marriage was struck down.

However, by late Saturday the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals, after first signaling it would not intervene in Michigan's gay marriage case until Tuesday, posted a new order imposing a stay on same-sex marriages until Wednesday. The stay means officials will not be able to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples before Wednesday at the earliest.

Glenna DeJong, 53, and Marsha Caspar, 52, both of Lansing, were married in the lobby after the clerk's office opened at 8 a.m. and issued them a license.

"We've been waiting 27 years for this," DeJong said.

Michigan is the 18th state in the nation to allow gay marriage. At least three counties planned to issue licenses on Saturday.

Muskegon County Clerk Nancy Waters said she has been prepared to issue licenses since October but was waiting for an official decision from U.S. District Judge Bernard Friedman.

After the decision, Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette filed an emergency stay request to prevent gay couples from marrying right away. Schuette emphasized the 59% approval by voters as well as tradition and child-rearing as reasons why the 2004 amendment, which banned gay marriage, should stand.

With no stay in place early Saturday, Washtenaw County Clerk Lawrence Kestenbaum said his office would issue 60 licenses Saturday.

"I wasn't expecting the ruling would go into effect immediately and I know there's going to be attempts to get a stay, but I'm assuming there won't be one by tomorrow," Kestenbaum said. "If there is, then I'll stop."

Oakland County Clerk Lisa Brown announced via Twitter her office would be open from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Saturday.

Wayne County resident Emily Graham, 37, said she planned to go to the clerk's office in Detroit on Monday.

"It's about time that we are able to be afforded the same rights," Graham said, before the stay was issued. "Not special rights, just the same rights as everyone. We just want to be looked at as equals in the eyes of the law."

"I am absolutely ecstatic," she added. "I've almost been apologetic about being gay, but now, this is who I am and I'm proud of it."

Before the late Saturday stay, Carl Tobias, a professor of law at the University of Richmond, had said it's not clear what would happen to the marriages if a stay was granted.

"The closest precedent we have is what happened in Utah where over a 1,000 people were married before the Supreme Court granted the stay," Tobias said. "The state did not recognize those marriages, people were in legal limbo with things like benefits and adoptions."

Contributing: Detroit Free Press; The Associated Press