Iowa's First Gay Marriage

DES MOINES, IA -- Two male Iowa State University students were married this morning following Judge Robert B. Hanson ruling Thursday that Iowa's law forbidding gay marriage was unconstitutional. Just an hour later, the judge suspended his ruling and blocked further marriages.

The couple, Tim McQuillan and Sean Fritz, obtained a marriage license and got a judge to sign a waiver allowing them to skip the usual three day waiting period, as is required by law.

Sean Fritz went and bought wedding rings last night, before proposing to Tim McQuillan.

"There was a lot of double-checking everything on the Internet to make sure that we got all the paperwork filled out correctly the first time," Fritz says. "We didn't want to get refused because we messed up a 't' somewhere."

Fritz also called McQuillan's mother in California to ask permission to marry her son.

McQuillan says Fritz instant messaged him over the Internet, telling him what was going on. "When he picked me up around nine o'clock he proposed to me on the spot. Besides the obvious shock, I still haven't recovered. Maybe it'll set in later this week."

They were married by the Rev. Mark Stringer of First Unitarian Church in Des Moines at 10:32 a.m., just an hour before the Polk County Recorder's office stopped accepting marriage license applications from same-sex couples.

The move came shortly after Polk County Judge Robert Hanson agreed to suspend his Thursday ruling that overturned Iowa's ban on same-sex marriages pending an appeal by the Polk County Attorney's Office to the Iowa Supreme Court.

County officials said 21 marriage licenses were issued before 11:30, most apparently to same-sex couples.

It's not clear whether the marriage of Tim McQuillan and Sean Fritz will remain legally valid even though they managed to complete the entire process - waiver, license and wedding - before the door on same-sex marriages again closed in Iowa.