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Gay-Marriage Ban Back on Agenda

Posted on: Sunday, 4 June 2006, 18:00 CDT

WASHINGTON _ The Senate this week will debate a measure that everybody knows is doomed _ a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage.

A waste of time? Not to its supporters. The purpose of debating the amendment now is not constitutional change. It is climate change _ of the political variety.

The Republican Party's conservative base has grown increasingly angry over immigration and federal spending, adding to other problems that make 2006 a tough election year for the GOP.

And politicians in trouble always turn to their base.

Sen. Sam Brownback, a chief supporter of the amendment, called the timing incidental: "I'll take the floor time when I can get it," the Kansas Republican said. "This is a critical policy issue."

But a senior aide to a congressional Republican said the timing was a bid to "stop the bleeding."

"This is one of those surefire ways to say, `See why you need us?'" said the aide, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the aide is not authorized to speak on such matters.

Along with the debate will come plenty of political theater: President Bush endorsed the amendment Saturday in his weekly radio address and plans to reiterate his support Monday afternoon at a White House event.

Among the people whose attention Republican leaders hope to capture: conservative voters in Missouri, who hold Sen. Jim Talent's re-election hopes in their hands.

Talent, a co-sponsor of the amendment, is in what polls show is a tight race with Democrat Claire McCaskill. But conservative angst, along with Talent's complex position on stem-cell research, has not revved up his base.

"He needs to reassure the base that he is the same conservative senator they've always known and loved," said George Connor, a professor of political science at Missouri State University, formerly Southwest Missouri State University. "These people aren't going to vote for Claire McCaskill. The danger is they sit out. He needs every vote. He can't have wavering conservatives."

Talent views the amendment as a way to beat back McCaskill.

"It's certainly an area where we disagree," Talent said. "I'm making the point that I've stood for commonsense conservative values in the state, and I don't think she does."

McCaskill, who hopes to win votes in conservative rural Missouri, said in a statement that she believes marriage should be between a man and a woman, but she does not think a constitutional amendment is necessary.

Nationally, polls show a slight majority of Americans support banning gay marriage, but the percentage has declined in recent years. The issue is not among voters' priorities, polls show.

But same-sex marriage has been a white-hot issue for social conservatives since 2004, when a Massachusetts court decreed that the state must recognize such unions.

At that time, Bush declared his support for a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage. But a measure that would have done so got nowhere near the required two-thirds majority to pass the House. And it got only 48 of the required 60 votes to end debate and move to a vote, where it then would have needed 67 votes to pass.

(Even if Congress had approved the measure, it would have needed to be ratified by at least 38 state legislatures, a high bar in itself.)

Observers say that since then the numbers have not changed enough to make a difference.

The current measure passed a Senate Judiciary subcommittee 5-4 and the full committee 10-8 _ hardly numbers that indicate widespread support.

"It's not going to pass," said Bruce Oppenheimer, a political science professor at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn. "They're not going to get 60 votes if you could only get 48 in 2004. ... The purpose is totally political."

The tactic forces some potentially vulnerable Democratic senators to make an uncomfortable vote, and it shows grumbling conservatives that Republicans are embracing their issues.

"This will give people a chance to see where their representatives stand," said Tom McClusky of the conservative Family Research Council, who conceded that the amendment is likely to fail.

Last week Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, a Tennessee Republican, told Fox News Channel that he was bringing up the ban because "marriage is under attack."

If so, marriage would seem to be defending itself pretty well.

So far, 45 states have banned gay marriage. The federal Defense of Marriage Act, passed in 1996 and signed into law by President Bill Clinton, already defines marriage as being between a man and a woman. It also says that states do not have to recognize gay marriages performed in other states.

But supporters of a constitutional amendment say that activist judges are a threat to state bans. Court challenges to state-level bans are pending in nine states. Judges recently tossed bans in Georgia and Nebraska. Others fear challenges to the 1996 federal law.

"We want to move this forward before the courts act," Brownback said. "This is of paramount interest in defining and building a strong society."

Opponents deride the amendment as an attempt to write discrimination into the Constitution, and they predict it will backfire on Republicans by further alienating swing voters.

After all, you can't win elections just with the base, said Joe Solmonese, president of the Human Rights Campaign, a gay-rights group.

"It shows how out of step the White House and Congress are with the priorities of the American people," Solmonese said.

Election-year posturing for the base probably will continue after the vote on the marriage amendment.

Frist has scheduled debate soon on a constitutional amendment to ban flag burning, another issue popular with conservatives that has a long history of congressional failure.

"It's called position-taking," said Connor, the Missouri State professor. "You publicly announce a position without follow-up or real accountability. ... We know it's just politics, but it's smart politics."

___

THE PROPOSAL

The constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage reads:

"Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman. Neither this Constitution, nor the constitution of any State, shall be construed to require that marriage or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon any union other than the union of a man and a woman."

___

(c) 2006, The Kansas City Star.

Visit The Star Web edition on the World Wide Web at http://www.kcstar.com/

Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services.

_____

ARCHIVE PHOTOS on KRT Direct (from KRT Photo Service, 202-383-6099): Jim Talent

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Source: The Kansas City Star (Kansas City, Missouri)

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