News

May 9, 2008

Pro-family activists in Pennsylvania are working feverishly to get a constitutional amendment protecting traditional marriage through both legislative bodies in that state. By a vote of 18 to 8, the Senate Appropriations Committee sent a marriage protection amendment to the full Senate. S.B. 1250 would define marriage as only between a man and a woman in Pennsylvania.

Diane Gramley, president of the American Family Association of Pennsylvania, says the amendment now heads to the full Senate where it is expected to pass. It will then go to the House, where she says it will be a tough fight.

"At this point we've pretty much concluded that it's going to be God doing it to get it to happen. Since we will be facing a much more liberal legislative body in the House, we're just praying that God will intervene and that it will happen," Gramley explains.

A marriage protection amendment, according to Gramley, is necessary to stop the radical agenda of homosexual activists. At a minimum, she says, those activists want civil unions legalized in Pennsylvania.

"That was evident in some of the testimony we heard last week during the Senate Appropriations Committee hearing," she shares. "And all we have to do is look at Connecticut and Vermont and New Jersey to see what happens when civil unions are legalized." Then at that point, she contends, homosexual activists will begin complaining they are being treated as second-class citizens and will demand legalization of same-sex "marriage."

Pro-family forces have until the end of June to get the amendment through both legislative bodies. Then the entire process must be repeated next year for the measure to appear on the ballot in November 2009.