States Rights: Although some licenses for same-sex marriage were issued in a few major Alabama cities yesterday, they were denied in an estimated 52 of 67 counties. The licenses were supposed to be issued throughout the state yesterday after a federal court decision, but the state’s own Chief Justice Roy Moore ordered Sunday that licenses must not be issued for gay marriage. The local judges were put in a squeeze.

During the day the US Supreme Court refused to block the decision of Federal District Court Judge Callie Granade, who ruled that Alabama’s ban on same sex marriage is unconstitutional. Some court watchers say it’s a signal that the Supreme Court will ultimately rule that gay marriage must be accepted.

For now, it’s a battle of state’s rights vs. federal courts, power vs. personality. Justice Moore is the same staunch Baptist who once had a 5,000 pound monument to the 10 Commandments installed in the rotunda of the Alabama Judicial System building. It was removed by federal order.

Nation: The new Republican governor of Illinois has fired a missile at state labor unions with an executive order barring unions from requiring all state employees to pay the equivalent of dues. “Forced union dues are a critical cog in the corrupt bargain that is crushing taxpayers,” Gov. Bruce Rauner said. About 6,500 state workers who choose not to be in the unions, but still benefit from union contract agreements, are required to pay fees in lieu of dues. Splitting off those 6,500 workers is seen by the unions as a financial attack on their power.

World: President Obama said yesterday in a joint appearance with German Chancellor Angela Merkel that the US is considering sending lethal weapons to help Ukraine fight rebels and Russian troops, but that decision has not yet been made. The president said he hopes political and economic pressure will do the job. He said, “If Russia continues on its current course — which is ruining the Russian economy and hurting the Russian people, as well as having such a terrible effect on Ukraine — Russia’s isolation will only worsen, both politically and economically.”

The Obit Page: Kenji Ekuan, the Japanese industrial designer who create the ubiquitous red-capped Kikkoman soy sauce bottle has died at age 85. He believed in the “democratization of goods,” making them handy and accessible to everyone. Ekuan designed everything from a bullet train to audio components and corporate logos. But that flowing flask-shaped soy sauce bottle is on shelves and tables around the world.

In Deep: The City of Boston is suffering through one of its snowiest winters on record; 73.9 inches so far and 60.8 in only the last 30 days. The city has been removing snow for the last 14 days. One of our readers, who was given bad information that “trains are never stopped by snow,” was on a train last night from New York to Boston that was stopped 12 miles short of downtown … by snow.

Extinction, Mate: Australia has lost a tenth of its native animal species over the last 200 years largely because of the introduction of the cat and fox into the wild. The remaining 21 percent are threatened, say scientists at Charles Darwin University. No other country has had such a high rate of extinction in that period, the study says. The extent of losses was previously unknown because it was happening mostly among small nocturnal creatures … mouse and squirrel-like animals.

Oh, Okay then: Former International Monetary Fund Chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn, who’s on trial for pimping, denies that he took part in orgies. Well, he denies he took part in that many orgies. He said it was only 12 over three years.

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