Bush cool on measure to ban gay ‘marriage’

President Bush yesterday declined to support a constitutional amendment banning homosexual “marriages,” despite Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist’s strong endorsement of such a ban.

“I don’t know if it’s necessary yet,” Mr. Bush told reporters in the Roosevelt Room of the White House. “Let’s let the lawyers look at the full ramifications of the recent Supreme Court hearing.”

He was referring to the 6-3 decision by the high court on Thursday to overturn Texas’ ban on sodomy, a ruling that some conservatives fear will pave the way for the legalization of homosexual “marriages.”

“What I do support is the notion that marriage is between a man and a woman,” the president said.

His comments fell short of Mr. Frist’s vigorous endorsement of a constitutional ban on same-sex “marriages.” Asked Sunday whether he supports such an amendment, the Tennessee Republican said: “I absolutely do, of course I do.”

Mr. Bush’s remarks were seen as tepid by some conservatives, including those who are unsure whether a constitutional amendment is the best strategy for ensuring that homosexual “marriages” would remain illegal under the law.

“We’d like to see him take it up a notch,” said Genevieve Wood of the Family Research Council. “The country needs leadership on this.”

Although Mrs. Wood agrees with Mr. Bush’s assertion that “marriage is between a man and a woman,” she said the president could go further.

“As the issue escalates, obviously his rhetoric is going to have to escalate,” she said. “We would like to see him get in front of the issue more forcefully in the future and not always just be responding to the courts — to be more proactive.”

White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer defended Mr. Bush’s wait-and-see approach, pointing out that the Supreme Court decision is barely a week old. He said it was too soon to weigh that ruling against the Defense of Marriage Act, signed by President Clinton in 1996, which prohibits the federal government from recognizing state-sanctioned homosexual “marriages.”

“I don’t know that there is any clear assessment that anybody has at this point about the legal ramifications of a just-made decision that was ruled on a basis that may or may not be analogous to the situation involving DOMA, the Defense of Marriage Act,” Mr. Fleischer told reporters.

Mr. Frist waited three days after the court ruling to call for a constitutional ban.

“I very much feel that marriage is a sacrament, and that sacrament should extend and can extend to that legal entity of a union between what [has] traditionally in our Western values been defined as between a man and a woman,” he told ABC’s “This Week.” “So I would support the amendment.”

Mr. Frist’s office declined to comment on the remarks by the president yesterday.

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