Jun 02, 2006  |  By: ELIZABETH PERRY  | COMMENTS     

President Bush is expected to hold a news conference in the White House Rose Garden June 5 to show support for a constitutional amendment banning gays from marrying, a measure that could be voted on as early as the following day.

But Bush’s expected public endorsement of the anti-gay amendment isn’t earning any praise among some of the most ardent supporters of the measure.

Joe Glover, president of the conservative Christian group Family Policy Network in Virginia, which supports the amendment, said he will attend the news conference, but that Bush’s support is too little, too late.

“The Bush administration is only tiptoeing around this amendment,” Glover said. “It’s clear he’s not serious about the amendment.

“He’s not doing a lot of arm-twisting to get votes or making campaign commitments to get votes. This administration could care less about protecting marriage. Otherwise they would have had a ceremony in the Rose Garden three or four weeks ago. There would be several sore arms in the Senate by now.”

Democrats have denounced the news conference and the amendment as an attempt by the White House and Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist of Tennessee to divert political attention and shore up the party’s support among evangelical voters.

“Neither Senator Frist nor President Bush should be using marriage as a wedge issue to pander to extremists in their conservative base or distract Americans from their failed leadership,” said Democratic National Committee spokesperson Damien LaVera.

“Because polls show that the American people, including their core supporters, have completely rejected their failed agenda, President Bush and Bill Frist are once again pushing a hate-filled constitutional amendment that attacks LGBT Americans.”

The amendment debate is once again taking on religious overtones. Both the Religious Coalition for Marriage, a pro-amendment group, and Clergy for Fairness, an anti-amendment group, are urging their supporters to inundate politicians with petitions and postcards.

Last month, some 50 Christian and Jewish leaders signed a petition backing the amendment to prohibit same-sex marriage.

The letter reiterates the position that marriage is between a man and a woman and encourages support for the amendment.

Focus on the Family founder James Dobson argued for the marriage amendment on his nationally syndicated radio show and sent e-mails to members urging them to contact senators. Radio and print ads sponsored by the organization will run in some states whose senators oppose the act.

It would take a two-thirds majority vote in the Senate and the House to pass the constitutional amendment, and then legislatures in three-quarters of the states would have to ratify. Most political observers predict the amendment effort will fail in the Senate, as it did two years ago, though it may win a simple majority this time.

An exact date for the Senate vote was not announced by press time, though some media reports have indicated a June 6 date. GOP House leaders have promised a vote on the measure before the November elections.

The pro-gay Clergy for Fairness is taking an opposing view on the marriage amendment and is encouraging religious congregations to take a stand. Supporters of the group include members of the Episcopal Church, United Church of Christ, Unitarian Universalist Association, liberal Judaism and Metropolitan Community Churches.

Rev. Katie Day, a Presbyterian and professor of Church and Society at Lutheran Theological Seminary in Philadelphia, and a member of Clergy for Fairness, said religious faith should not be “hijacked by people who are supportive of the amendment.”