Alabama’s new state marriage law went into today, Aug. 29.

The bill, passed by the State Legislature on May 23, disregards the practice of issuing a marriage license and instead replaces it with requirements for a state-provided certificate that must be completed and notarized before being delivered back to a Probate Judge’s office within 30 days of the final signature. The Probate Judge will then record, not issue, the license.

Dallas County Attorney John Kelly took to the podium at Tuesday morning’s 60-Minute Coffee event, hosted by the Selma-Dallas County Chamber of Commerce, to explain to the community the details of the state’s new legislation.

“Everything changes on Aug. 29,” said Kelly at Tuesday’s event. “There will no longer be a marriage license in the state of Alabama. People will no longer go to the Probate Judge to get a marriage license. The genesis of that was that certain Probate Judges were opposed to issuing marriage licenses to same sex [couples]. So the [state] legislature said, ‘we will wipe out the marriage licenses.’”

Kelly then went into detail about the new marriage process.

“What will happen now,” he said, “Is you will go and get a form, online or from the Probate Court, sign it, have your husband or wife to sign it, date it and the only requirement is that you take the form within 30 days of the final signature to the Probate Court to be recorded. The date of your marriage then, is the date of the final signature on the form. It will be sent to the Department of Public Health to be recorded.”

“That’s it,” interjected Probate Judge Jimmy Nunn.

“Ceremonial marriage. Is it required? No,” added Kelly. “No more ceremonial marriages except to make you feel good or adhere to whatever your religious sub-mandates may be.”

Kelly joked that the new process will save some people a lot of money.