$134,000 in attorney's fees to the plaintiffs who successfully challenged the state's ban on same-sex marriage. Swicegood v. Thompson On March 13, 2014, Cathy Swicegood filed for divorce from Polly Thompson in a state trial court, alleging that they were common-law married. Swicegood and Thompson had been together for 13 years, shared a home, bank accounts and other property, and Swicegood was also covered under Thompson's health insurance plan. The lawsuit asked that a judge officially recognize Swicegood's union with Thompson and order that their joint property be equitably divided. Thompson filed a motion to dismiss for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction because the parties were not married and lacked the capacity to marry at the time. A family court dismissed Swicegood's action on May 7, 2014, ruling that a common-law marriage between two persons of the same sex was not legally possible according to state statutes. Swicegood appealed. In an unpublished opinion, the South Carolina Court of Appeals later remanded the case back to the family court with instructions to "consider the implications of Obergefell on its subject-matter jurisdiction". The family court ruled upon remand that the couple could not have formed a common-law marriage because the state's same-sex marriage ban was in place throughout the couple's 13 years together. The Court of Appeals affirmed the lower court's decision upon appeal on July 1, 2020, determining that South Carolina prohibited same-sex couples from "forming the requisite intent to be married at common-law" prior to the November 2014 decision in Condon. On November 10, 2021, the South Carolina Supreme Court, basing its reasoning on Obergefell, which held that state same-sex marriage bans are void ab initio, dispensed with briefing and vacated the provision of the Court of Appeals' opinion that same-sex couples could not form common-law marriages prior to November 2014. However, because Swicegood did not hold herself out as married during the times she lived with Thompson, the Supreme Court upheld the finding that no common-law marriage existed. South Carolina prospectively abolished common-law marriage in 2019 in Stone v. Thompson. Developments after legalization In January 2016, a group of 5 Republican lawmakers and one Democrat introduced the South Carolina Natural Marriage Defense Act to the General Assembly. The bill sought to prohibit state officials from marrying same-sex couples and require the Attorney General to defend any official who is sued or ordered by a federal judge to issue marriage licenses