The North Dakota Senate has rejected a resolution calling on the U. S. Supreme Court to overturn a 2015 ruling that legalized same sex marriage.
The vote on HCR 3013 was 16 yes, 31 no. It earlier passed the House.
But it wasn’t a roll call vote. Instead, it was done by verification vote. That means the individual votes were not recorded.
Sen. Josh Boschee (D-Fargo) said the resolution itself has “no weight of law.”
"But that letter we would be sending to the Supreme Court has another audience — and that's North Dakota," Boschee said. "So while we consider this as meaningless because the Supreme Court won't be paying attention, we all know, based on the e-mails, the phone calls and the texts we've received, that many North Dakotans are paying attention to this."
Boschee then asked for a roll-call vote. It takes eight senators to make that happen. Only 6 stood up for it. Senator Sean Cleary (R-Bismarck) was one of them.
"I think we owe that to our constituents, when we come to this chamber on issues that are of public importance," Cleary said.
Sen. David Clemens (R-West Fargo) supported the resolution. He said the US Constitution does not mention marriage, but the North Dakota Constitution does, defining it as between one man and one woman.
"When I took the oath of office, I promised to uphold and support the Constitution of North Dakota," Clemens said. "I also believe we are a sovereign state. And the responsibility of marriage is not the role of the federal government."
A Massachusetts based group – MassResist” – has been pushing this resolution across the country.
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