Texas Judge Can Refuse to Marry Same-Sex Couples, Court Says (1)

A Texas judge can refuse to marry same-sex couples because of her religious beliefs, a state court ruled, a groundbreaking decision in a more than five-year-old case testing the limits of religious freedom protections for judges who are otherwise to remain impartial.

Judge Dianne Hensley of Waco, Texas, had her religious rights violated when a state commission issued a public warning in 2019 that stopped her from marrying only opposite-sex couples, Judge Maria Cantú Hexsel of the state’s 53rd District Court wrote in an order Thursday.

Hexsel rejected the commission’s bid to present the case to a jury, finding no “genuine issue” as to whether Hensley’s refusal to marry same-sex couples was motivated by her religious beliefs.

Hensley, a Catholic, drew a public warning from the State Commission on Judicial Conduct after she told a reporter she wouldn’t marry same-sex couples. Hensley made the comments following a US Supreme Court decision that guaranteed marriage rights to same-sex couples nationwide in 2015. The commission said her system of referring same-sex couples to other wedding officiants is problematic for a judge because it expresses partiality against certain people.

Hensley, who stopped performing all marriages, said she lost about $60,000 in lost income. Hexsel’s order entitles her to $10,000 in damages, the maximum amount permitted under the state’s religious freedom act.

Hensley is also entitled to reasonable attorney’s fees, court costs, and other reasonable expenses incurred in the litigation.

The order rejects arguments the commission made at a December hearing about Hensley’s true motivation for refusing to marry same-sex couples. Rather than religion, it could’ve been politics that informed her decision, the commission’s lawyer, John Atkins of Thompson Coburn, argued in asking for a jury to resolve that question.

The decision follows previous wins for Hensley at the Texas Supreme Court, which ruled in 2024 that she could challenge the commission’s warning through the courts system rather than administratively. Then, in May 2025, Hensley got a favorable ruling when an intermediary appeals court said she deserved an answer on whether she can resume marrying only opposite sex-couples without the fear of new penalties — a decision that came after the commission withdrew its earlier warning.

While waiting on a decision from Hexsel, Hensley sued the judicial conduct commission in federal court on Dec. 19. She’s asking, among other things, for courts to overrule Obergefell v. Hodges, the Supreme Court decision that allowed for same-sex marriages nationwide.

She also could join a proposed class-action from other justices of the peaces who opted out of marrying any couples rather than marrying same-sex couples.

Hexsel’s decision came hours before the Texas Supreme Court blasted the judicial conduct commission in a Friday morning opinion. Writing alone, Chief Justice Jimmy Blacklock questioned why the commission asked the court to clarify its one-word answer — “No” — to a question certified by a federal appeals court as to whether performing only opposite-sex weddings for religious reasons is a violation of judicial ethics canon.

The court’s answer came in a case involving another judge but also cleared up the same issue in the Hensley case.

“Of course, the insufficiency of a court’s explanation of its answer in the mind of the losing party has nothing to do with the clarity of the court’s answer,” Blacklock wrote. “There is no clearer answer than ‘no.’”

Hensley is represented by Mitchell Law PLLC.

The case is Hensley v. State Commission on Judicial Conduct, Tex. Dist. Ct., No. D-1-GN-20-003926, 2/19/26.