The Town of Cedar Bluff Thursday received a favorable ruling in its lawsuit seeking to make the results of a wet-dry referendum binding.

The Alabama Supreme Court ruled 9-0 in the Town of Cedar Bluff’s favor, thus reversing the October of 2003 ruling by Cherokee County Circuit Judge David Rains that nullified Cedar Bluff’s successful wet-dry vote of Aug. 12, 2003.

Cedar Bluff Mayor Bob Davis said he is proceding with caution, and that he had not seen a copy of the 20-page ruling as of Friday.

“We’ll just take it one day at a time,” Davis said Friday morning. “We’ll let it go through the court system.”

Despite that caution, Davis admitted to some optimism. “It’s defenitely a plus on our part,” the mayor said. We’ll have to sit and wait, see what Judge Rains does. We have no idea. We’re pleased with this part of it, but nothing’s done until it’s done.

“The ball’s in our court now, but it moves up to the (legal) court, what Judge Rains … how he digests the document.”

The referendum was held on Aug 9, 2003, with Cedar Bluff voters approving the sale by a 649 to 239 count. Four days earlier, a suit had been filed that ultimately halted proceedings from the vote. Several weeks later, Judge Rains overturned the result of the vote, bringing onthe Cedar Bluff town appeal that sent it to the Alabama Supreme Court.

“We’re pleased so far with the verdict,” Davis said. “We hope it stands. But we know nothing.”

The group that sued over the vote, Citizens Caring for Children, had no standing to challenge the vote or the law that allowed the vote, according to Chief Justice Drayton Nabers.

Three days after the vote, Judge Rains put the results on hold. He then ruled on Oct. 20, 2003 that the law passed in the 2003 Legislature that allowed the vote was unconstitutional. That voided the wet-dry vote, stopping the Town of Cedar Bluff from issuing alcohol licenses.

The Supreme Court stated that Carl Green, who filed a suit on behalf of Citizens for Caring Children, neither had the right to challenge the Aug. 12 election nor the question voted on in the election. Green couldn’t prevail because he didn’t establish an actual injury, according to Chief Justice Nabers