Massachusetts: No Amendment

The joint meeting of the state legislature has voted 157-39 against forwarding to the voters the proposed constitutional amendment that would bar same sex marriage but establish civil unions. The amendment passed last year 105-92 after days of heated and emotional debate, but needed to pass again this year in order to proceed. The debate on the issue this year was less than two hours.

Next up: The citizen's petition seeking to place a ballot question before the voters that would bar marriage equality, bar civil unions, and nullify existing marriages between same sex couples. The question's backers must collect 65,825 signatures before it can be brought before the legislature. A citizen's petition must be approved by 25% of the legislature in two sessions before it can go to the ballot, so the earliest we might see this at the polls is November 2008. But hopefully it will fail well before then.