Burns v. Hickenlooper is a lawsuit filed on July 1, 2014, in federal district court in Colorado, challenging that state's denial of marriage rights to same-sex couples.

The defendants agreed with the substance of the plaintiffs' case, but asked the district court to stay implementation of any order requiring Colorado to alter enforcement of its ban pending the outcome of other litigation.

Following U.S. Supreme Court action in other cases, on October 8 they asked the Tenth Circuit to dismiss their appeal and lift the stay, which would effectively legalize same-sex marriage in Colorado.

[3][4][5] Judge Raymond Moore issued an order in Burns v. Hickenlooper on July 23, granting the plaintiff same-sex couples' motion for a preliminary injunction.

[7] On August 21, Circuit Judges Harris Hartz and David Ebel granted the state attorney general's application for a stay.

In their order, they cited similar stays granted in Kitchen v. Herbert and Bishop v. Oklahoma upon filing of petitions for certiorari and wrote: "[i]n the interests of consistency, we see no reason to deviate from this approach in this case."