DENVER (AP) – As Clela Rorex sits back and watches the national debate unfold over marriage for gays and lesbians, she smiles knowing she’s seen it all before.

After all, the former Boulder County clerk and recorder issued marriage licenses to same-sex couples back in 1975.

“Politicians in ‘75 didn’t want to touch this with a 10-foot pole, not even Democrats,” Rorex said, framing today’s debate with one she was the central figure in nearly 30 years ago.

As a newly elected political rookie in 1975, Rorex was approached by a same-sex couple who asked if she would issue a marriage license. They told her they had been denied by a clerk in El Paso County.

After securing a legal opinion from the Boulder County district attorney at the time, who said state law did not preclude issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples, Rorex issued the license.

“I issued licenses because I didn’t want to be legislating morality,” Rorex said, adding she knew little about gays and lesbians at the time.

Once the media latched onto the issue, though, hate mail and calls from state politicians started pouring in, Rorex said.

As word spread, more gay and lesbian couples came to her asking for licenses, and she would grant them. She said she issued licenses to about a half dozen gay and lesbian couples in early 1975.

“The state Legislature was all in a panic over this, needless to say,” Rorex said. “Even some of the Democratic legislators at the time were very critical of me issuing licenses because they did not want to have to address the issue, so they were trying to avoid it like crazy.”

Legislators then asked for a legal opinion from the state attorney general at the time, J.D. MacFarlane. He said that his office drafted an opinion that state law was clear on the issue, and that marriage is a union between a man and a woman.

Soon after, Rorex stopped issuing licenses, especially after a man came in trying to get a license for himself and his horse, Dolly. Rorex told him the horse was too young to get married without parental consent.

Rorexsaid she’s enjoying the current debate over marriage for gays and lesbians, and applauds the politicians who stand up in favor of it. It also helps her put her role in the debate into perspective.

“I am prouder now than I ever comprehended then that I would be of the action that I took,” Rorex said.