WASHINGTON (ABP) — Opponents of same-sex marriage capped a week of good news Jan. 24 as an amendment to ban the practice was re-introduction in Congress.
However, observers believe the proposal is unlikely to become law anytime soon.
Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) announced he would co-sponsor a newly reintroduced Marriage Protection Amendment that, if passed by a two-thirds majority in both houses of Congress and approved by three-fourths of the states, would outlaw marriage and its “legal incidents” for same-sex couples nationwide. The amendment failed a procedural vote in the Senate last year.
The announcement came after a trifecta of wins for gay-marriage foes in state and federal courts. A federal judge in Florida turned down a lesbian couple's challenge to the federal Defense of Marriage Act on Jan. 19. The next day, the Louisiana Supreme Court upheld a state constitutional amendment banning gay marriage, and an Indiana appeals court said the state constitution does not require marriage rights to be offered to same-sex couples on the same basis as heterosexual couples.
However, Senate observers noted the federal amendment is unlikely to pass this year. In a recent interview with the Washington Post, President Bush suggested he would not invest significant political capital in attempting to force the amendment through Congress.
According to the New York Times, a group of conservative religious leaders who support the marriage amendment sent a letter to a senior White House advisor Jan. 18 complaining about Bush's statements. It asked political advisor Karl Rove to appoint a high-level White House aide to focus on getting the amendment passed.
“We trust that you can imagine our deep disappointment at the defeatist position President Bush demonstrated” in the newspaper interview, the letter was quoted as saying.
According to the Times, the letter was written by leaders of an anti-gay-marriage coalition known as the Arlington Group. It includes some of Bush's most prominent conservative evangelical allies, including Focus on the Family head James Dobson and Southern Baptist Convention leader Richard Land.