14-July-2004 -- Catholic World News Brief

SENATE VOTES AGAINST MARRIAGE AMENDMENT

Washington, DC, Jul. 14 (CWNews.com) - The US Senate on Wednesday voted 50-48 against continuing debate on a proposed constitutional amendment to define marriage as the union of one man and one woman, 12 short of the 60 needed to continue and 19 short of the two-thirds majority needed to approve an amendment.

"This is an unnecessary amendment that wrongly and certainly prematurely deprives states of their traditional ability to define marriage," said Sen. Joseph Lieberman, D-Connecticut, claiming that the matter was an issue of states' rights. However, supporters pointed out that an amendment was needed in order to prevent courts, and not voters, from deciding the issue, as happened last November in Massachusetts when the Supreme Judicial Court decided that denying same-sex marriage to gays was unconstitutional.

"The Senate's vote today has left the future of marriage in the hands of unelected judges, at least for the time being," said Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council. But, he added, the fight is not over. "Pro-family forces have benefited from the debate over the past few days in two ways: One, every time this issue is forced into the public square, the opposition to same-sex 'marriage' among the American public grows. Second, we now know which Senators are for traditional marriage and which ones are not, and by November, so will voters in every state."

That was the core of the complaint by opponents of the amendment: that supporters knew the amendment would fail, but would rather push the amendment as a political issue during the current election cycle.

Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry, the Democratic presidential candidate who was not present for the vote, said a constitutional amendment should not be used for partisan purposes. "The floor of the United States Senate should only be used for the common good, not issues designed to divide us for political purposes," he said. "However, even Republicans concede that this amendment is being offered only for political gains."

Of the 24 Catholics in the Senate, those who voted against the amendment included Joe Biden, D-Delaware; John Breaux, D-Louisiana; Maria Cantwell, D-Washington; Susan Collins, R-Maine; Tom Daschle, D-South Dakota; Christopher Dodd, D-Connecticut; Richard Durbin, D-Illinois; Tom Harkin, D-Idaho; Ted Kennedy, D-Massachusetts; Mary Landrieu, D-Louisiana; Patrick Leahy, D-Vermont; Barbara Mikulski, D-Maryland; Patty Murray, D-Washington, Jack Reed, D-Rhode Island; and John Sununu, R-New Hampshire.