Just as homosexual "marriage" advocates were hoping they could point the U.S. Supreme Court to an unbroken string of federal court rulings advancing their cause, a federal judge in Alabama blinked, giving traditional marriage proponents hope that the issue will be left up to states.

The high court justices will be hearing arguments on the dispute in just weeks. In recent years, federal judge after federal judge has determined that the Supreme Court's decision to strike the federal Defense of Marriage Act meant state definitions of marriage as only the union of a man and a woman also had to go.

However, majority justices on the Alabama Supreme Court argued that U.S. Supreme Court opinion doesn't support the argument.

In its order that probate judges in Alabama issue marriage certificates, only to man-and-woman couples, the state justices noted: "An open question exists as to whether Windsor's 'equal dignity' notion works in the same direction toward state laws concerning marriage as it did toward DOMA. The Windsor court stated that 'the history of DOMA's enactment and its own text demonstrate that interference with the equal dignity of same-sex marriages, a dignity conferred by the states in the exercise of their sovereign power, was more than an incidental effect of the federal statute."

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The Alabama court wrote: "In Windsor, New York's law allowed same-sex couples to obtain marriage licenses. Thus, the 'dignity' was conferred by the state's own choice, a choice that was 'without doubt a proper exercise of its sovereign authority within our federal system, all in the way that the Framers of the Constitution intended.'"

But it then raised a question: Why, if New York could make that choice, would Alabama be deprived of exactly the same choice?

"The problem with DOMA was that it interfered with New York's 'sovereign' choice," the Alabama court said. "Alabama 'used its historic and essential authority to define the marital relations' and made a different 'sovereign' choice than New York. If New York was free to make that choice, it would seem inconsistent to say that Alabama is not free to make its own choice, especially given that 'the recognition of civil marriages is central to state domestic relations law applicable to its residents and citizens.'"

It was U.S. District Judge Callie Granade in January who decided to rewrite both Alabama's state constitution and state law to allow same-sex marriage. But unlike the two dozen or more other states where judges had issue similar rulings, in Alabama the chief justice of the state Supreme Court, pointing out that state judges had an obligation to interpret the U.S. Constitution equal to that of federal judges, issued an administrative order for them not to comply with Granade's ruling.

The full state Supreme Court, in response to a request from citizens' groups, later made that a legal order.

Caught in the middle was one probate judge, Don Davis, who had been added as a lawsuit defendant by Granade so she could order him to grant licenses to the plaintiffs, which was done.

Davis then asked her to suspend her order to remove the conflict with the state court order, and she refused.

But Mat Staver, chairman of Liberty Counsel, which represented the Alabama citizens' groups, noted that she also declined to specifically confront the state ruling.

"We are pleased that the Alabama Supreme Court's order is being respected and followed throughout the state of Alabama," he said. "The federal court has no authority to force the Alabama probate judges to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, and that lack of authority has been admitted by the federal court. The law in Alabama is clear. Marriage is only between one man and one woman. Other states should follow the lead of Alabama."

He told WND much of the information being released about the issue amounts to a fog in front of the basic constitutional holding from the DOMA case. But that focal point already is getting the notice of the U.S. Supreme Court justices who will rule.

"Oh, it's going to be cited there," he told WND.

Liberty Counsel explained that the original case plaintiffs, who already had their licenses, were urging Granade to order that licenses be granted to same-sex duos who were not part of the case.

But she didn't.

According to the Montgomery Advertiser, she let her order for the case plaintiffs stand, explaining that her opinion matches that of other judges.

Cited was the 2013 decision by the U.S. Supreme Court to strike DOMA.

But the Advertiser said she did not rule directly on the state court's final determination.

WND reported Family Research Council senior fellow Peter Sprigg suggested the Supreme Court may tread lightly when it considers whether states have the right to define marriage only as the union of one man and one woman.

"I would hope that that lesson [the Alabama decision] would be one more thing that would chasten the Supreme Court a bit and make them reluctant to overturn not just the laws but the constitutions of a majority of U.S. states on the issue of marriage," said Sprigg, a defender of traditional marriage.

He said after all, Alabama may be just the tip of the iceberg.

"I think what is happening in Alabama shows that the federal courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court, should not necessarily operate on the expectation that everyone on the state level will simply roll over and play dead because a federal court expresses its opinion on this issue," Sprigg said.

"There are limits to how much the courts can impose their will simply by virtue of their prestige and so forth when they're clearly going beyond anything found in the text of the Constitution," he said.

Listen to the WND/Radio America interview with Peter Sprigg:

"I think people who believe that the Windsor case is going to dictate the outcome of this case are mostly people who haven't actually read the Windsor decision," Sprigg said. "That decision was premised on the assertion of the court that the Defense of Marriage Act constituted an unconstitutional federal interference with state definitions of marriage."

He continued: "If that same principle is applied in the current case, that the federal government has an obligation to respect states' definitions of marriage, then this time it would mean that the federal government, in this case the Supreme Court, has to respect states that have chosen to define marriage as the union of one man and one woman," he said.

The case pending before the U.S. Supreme Court is from the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which affirmed the rights of voters in four states – Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio and Tennessee – to define marriage as the union of one man and one woman.

The appeals opinion said: "Of all the ways to resolve this question, one option is not available: a poll of the three judges on this panel, or for that matter all federal judges, about whether gay marriage is a good idea. Our judicial commissions did not come with such a sweeping grant of authority, one that would allow just three of us – just two of us in truth – to make such a vital policy call for the thirty-two million citizens who live within the four states of the Sixth Circuit."

Alabama's decision also noted the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled "the states, at the time of the adoption of the Constitution, possessed full power over the subject of marriage and divorce … [and] the Constitution delegated no authority to the government of the United States on the subject of marriage and divorce."

Two justices on the U.S. Supreme Court already have taken public actions in support of "gay marriage," officiating at such wedding ceremonies.

The American Family Association launched a campaign offering a way for citizens to tell their representatives in Congress that the two justices shouldn't rule on the case.

"U.S. Supreme Court Justices Elena Kagan and Ruth Bader Ginsburg should recuse themselves from any cases involving the homosexual marriage issue on the basis that they have conducted same-sex marriage ceremonies," the campaign letter states.

Christian evangelist Franklin Graham, who heads both the relief and development group Samaritan's Purse and the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, also weighed in.

His Facebook posting challenged the dozens of orders from federal judges across the country who have imposed same-sex marriage on populations that voted against it.

"No earthly court has jurisdiction over the infallible Word of God," he said.