Although the rush had died down at Cambridge City Hall after Monday’s exuberant early-morning celebration, same-sex couples continued to exercise their new legal right to marry yesterday, joining the more than 1,000 gay couples who have now wed across the state.

The unions occurred even as opponents renewed their calls for a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage and Gov. W. Mitt Romney, R-Mass., pledged to enforce a law preventing out-of-state couples from obtaining licenses in Massachusetts.

Shortly before closing time yesterday, the Cambridge City Clerk’s office had received 282 applications for marriage licenses since the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court (SJC) ruling allowing same-sex marriage took effect on Monday, the vast majority of these coming from same-sex couples.

Twenty-four same-sex couples had obtained court waivers of the three-day waiting period in order to be married immediately, according to Deputy City Clerk Donna Lopez.

The clerk’s office gave out 227 of the license applications between midnight and 4:30 a.m. on Monday, when City Hall opened to allow same-sex couples to file for marriage at the earliest possible moment.

Forty-three couples returned later in the day on Monday to register their intentions to marry, and the city clerk performed 23 same-sex marriages—the first, Marcia Kadish and Tanya McCloskey of Malden, at 9:15 a.m.

“You couldn’t even move at one point in here,” said staff member Marybeth Cosgrove, describing the scene in the clerk’s office, which processed only 12 license applications on May 14, before same-sex marriage became legal.

“They’ve been happy, excited, shaking,” she said of the couples.

Ripped confetti, deflated balloons and candy wrappers scattered across the City Hall lawn were the only remnants yesterday of the party that took place into the early morning hours on Monday, when the city commemorated the occasion with a wedding cake, music and speeches, and thousands gathered outside to cheer for the couples.

But inside, pink and white ribbons still decorated the banisters, and bouquets of flowers rested on a table in the city clerk’s office, donated by Central Square Florist and addressed to “Any Body. City Hall. Cambridge, MA.”

As couples in Cambridge and across the state seek licenses, the possibility remains that same-sex marriages will no longer be legal in two years if a proposed state constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage succeeds.

In March, the Massachusetts State Legislature gave its first approval to the amendment, which would define marriage as between one man and one woman but would establish civil unions for same-sex couples. The legislature must pass the amendment again in the 2005-2006 session before it is put to a statewide referendum.

At the celebration at City Hall Sunday night, shortly before the first couples were allowed to file for marriage licenses, State Rep. Alice K. Wolf, D-Cambridge, a vocal opponent of the proposed amendment, told reporters she was optimistic that it would not pass.

“There’s a good shot at having it voted down next year,” said Wolf, who will serve as a witness at a same-sex marriage later this week.

A challenge to same-sex marriage could also come at the national level. President George W. Bush has voiced support for a federal constitutional amendment limiting marriage to heterosexual couples.