injunction that forces the state to recognize plaintiffs' marriages. The attorney general cited the stay granted by the U.S. Supreme Court in January in another same-sex marriage case, Kitchen v. Herbert. Court of Appeals proceedings On April 25, 2014, the Sixth Circuit, in an unpublished per curiam order, issued a stay of the district court's decision in Tanco, and ordered that the case be assigned to a panel of judges on the Sixth Circuit for expedited consideration on the merits. The effect of this order is to stay the preliminary injunction awarded to plaintiffs by the district court, meaning that the state of Tennessee will no longer have to recognize the legally consummated same-sex marriages of the six named plaintiffs in the Tanco case until after the appeal is decided. The Sixth Circuit said that its decision to stay the order is based on the "unsettled" nature of the law, as well as the public interest and the interests of the parties. The Sixth Circuit heard oral arguments on August 6. On November 6, the Sixth Circuit ruled 2–1 that Tennessee's ban on same-sex marriage does not violate the constitution. It said it was bound by the U.S. Supreme Court's 1972 action in a similar case, Baker v. Nelson, which dismissed a same-sex couple's marriage claim "for want of a substantial federal question." Writing for the majority, Judge Jeffrey Sutton also dismissed the arguments made on behalf of same-sex couples in this case: "Not one of the plaintiffs' theories, however, makes the case for constitutionalizing the definition of marriage and for removing the issue from the place it has been since the founding: in the hands of state voters." Dissenting, Judge Martha Craig Daughtrey wrote: "Because the correct result is so obvious, one is tempted to speculate that the majority has purposefully taken the contrary position to create the circuit split regarding the legality of same-sex marriage that could prompt a grant of certiorari by the Supreme Court and an end to the uncertainty of status and the interstate chaos that the current discrepancy in state laws threatens." Supreme Court proceedings On November 14, the same-sex couples filed an application for certiorari with the U.S. Supreme Court. They asked the court to consider whether the U.S. Constitution protects a "fundamental right to marry", whether Tennessee's refusal to recognize same-sex marriages from other jurisdictions unlawfully restricts their right to travel, and