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Some Federal Marriage Amendment backers feel the amendment's current wording does not go far enough in preventing civil unions. On October 1, a coalition of conservative, pro-traditional family organizations known as the Arlington Group overwhelmingly voted to support stronger language. The Arlington Group, headed by Don Wildmon of the American Family Association, met again in mid-October.

"There is unanimous support in pro-family groups that this needs to be strengthened," said Jan LaRue, chief counsel of Concerned Women for America. "States could have faux marriage. This is what's happening in Vermont and California" where the state legislatures have voted to grant the benefits of marriage to domestic partners. "We want to protect the institution of marriage, not just the name."

The proposed change would add a sentence that reads: "Neither the federal government nor any state shall predicate benefits, privileges, rights or immunities on the existence, recognition, or presumption of non-marital sexual conduct or relationships."

Other activists say this language would be a deal-killer, including AFM's Matt Daniels.

"There is no way that could be ratified, ever," he said. "It is politically dead, a failure."

A high-ranking senatorial aide said that the new wording invalidating civil unions is "a political impossibility" in the Senate.

The debate among conservatives over whether or how hard to push for broader language is "the key question right now," said Stanton. "We as a community have had a hard time finding a good balance between principle and pragmatism."

Support for a marriage amendment crosses the political aisle. Rep. Marilyn Musgrave (R-Colo.) has 96 House cosponsors for a proposed Federal Marriage Amendment, although only seven are Democrats. Cosponsors in the House include Collin Peterson (D-Minn.), Mike McIntyre (D-N.C.), Ralph Hall (D-Texas), Jo Ann Davis (R-Va.), and David Vitter (R-La.).

Still, Democratic Party leaders appear poised to fight a marriage amendment in any form. In October, McAuliffe assailed what he called a strategy "to repeal hundreds of laws enacted by state legislatures to provide basic benefits and rights to gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender Americans."

Nonetheless, the proposed amendment, which does not include the new language, would need to be approved by two-thirds of both the House and Senate and ratified by three-fourths (38) of the states.

The new language has been presented to Musgrave, who told ct that she is "meeting with the groups concerned about this, and we will be getting the best language possible."

Activists say the debate will only intensify now that the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court has ruled in Goodridge v. Massachusetts Department of Public Health-a ruling that has forced the legislature to decide how to provide for gay marriages. With the adverse decision in Goodridge, said a Senate aide, the Senate may have the momentum to pass the amendment.

The amendment has yet to be introduced in the Senate. Without an adverse decision in Goodridge, said a Senate aide, the Senate likely would lack the momentum to pass the amendment.

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) has publicly endorsed it.

The Goodridge ruling may also prove critical in Republicans' decision to include a marriage plank in their national platform. Republican National Committee Chairman Ed Gillespie told The Washington Times in September that such a plank "would be in the form of a proposed amendment to the Constitution" and would define marriage as a monogamous, heterosexual union.

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December 2003, Vol. 47, No. 12