A defiant Kentucky clerk has told a US judge that she cannot comply with an order to issue marriage licences to gay couples because it would violate her conscience.

Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis was jailed after she refused to comply with District Judge David Bunning's order.

Davis testified for about 20 minutes and was very emotional. She talked about when she became a Christian.

"You can't be separated from something that's in your heart and in your soul," she told the judge.

After she was jailed, hundreds of people outside the courthouse started chanting and screaming, "Love won! Love won!"

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