A Massachusetts law enacted in 1913 invalidated the marriage of non-residents if the marriage was invalid in the state where they lived. Historians and legal scholars believe it originated in an upsurge of anti-miscegenation sentiment associated with the notoriety of champion boxer Jack Johnson's marriages to white women. Though moribund for decades, it was used to prevent same-sex couples who were residents of other states from marrying in Massachusetts. As the date neared for the issuance of marriage licenses to same-sex couples, the Governor and some town clerks disputed how and whether that law should be enforced, and Romney had used the state's authority to block the same-sex marriages of non-residents from being properly recorded. He told a news conference: "We certainly won't record on our public health records marriages that are on the face of them not consistent with the law". The clerks soon relented under orders from the Attorney General. In June 2004, GLAD brought a lawsuit, "Cote-Whitacre v. Department of Public Health", on behalf of several out-of-state same-sex couples and several town clerks who objected to being forced to discriminate in denying licenses to such couples. The SJC upheld the law on March 30, 2006, though it allowed that residents of states like New York and Vermont, which did not explicitly exclude same-sex couples from marriage, might pursue the case further. On September 29, 2006, Superior Court Justice Connolly determined that same-sex couples who reside in Rhode Island can marry in Massachusetts after finding "that same-sex marriage is ... not prohibited in Rhode Island". In May 2007, Judge Connolly declared valid the marriages of several same-sex couples, residents of New York, who married in Massachusetts before July 6, 2006, when a New York court issued a ruling that same-sex marriage was not legal there, New York's first explicit prohibition on same-sex marriage. In July 2007, the DPH ruled that same-sex couples from New Mexico, where whether the law prohibits same-sex marriage is disputed, can obtain marriage licenses in Massachusetts.