After passage this week in the House, a
proposed constitutional ban on gay marriage moves to the Indiana
Senate.
On Thursday, Senate President Pro Tem
David Long announced that House Joint Resolution 3 will not be vetted
in the Senate Judiciary Committee as he previously had said.
Instead, the proposal will be heard in the Senate Rules Committee,
which is chaired by Long.
“I'd like to see a clean bill come to
the floor of the Senate,” Long told
the AP. “I will say that once it comes to the floor, any and
all amendments are going to be considerable and available. There
will be no attempt to block anything. There will be a full and
robust discussion.”
Before sending the measure to the
Senate, the House stripped out language which also banned civil
unions and other similar arrangements.
Following passage, supporters
immediately began lobbying senators to restore the language.
“We'll be working with the Senate to
restore the second sentence,” Curt Smith, president of the Indiana
Family Institute, told the Courier
Journal. “Retaining the second sentence makes the first
sentence much more likely to survive a legal challenge.”
“Urge the Indiana Senate to restore
the removed language of #HJR3 and pass the original version of the
bill,” tweeted Brian Brown, president of the National Organization
for Marriage (NOM).
Altering the proposed ban's language
would likely keep it off this year's ballot, because before an
amendment can head to voters, it needs to pass the General Assembly
in two consecutive two-year sessions. If the House and Senate agree
to the measure as altered, the earliest the modified amendment could
reach voters is 2016.
The Senate Rules Committee is expected
to hold a hearing on the measure the week of February 10.