The Tennessee House of Representatives approved legislation Thursday that would allow private individuals and organizations to decline to recognize same-sex marriages.
According to LifeSite News, House Bill 1473 passed by a majority of 68-24. All Republicans voted in favor, while all Democrats voted against it.
The bill does not challenge the legality of same-sex marriage.
However, it would exempt banks, medical institutions, and other private entities from recognizing what it calls “a purported marriage between individuals of the same sex.”
It also states that government officials may not face discipline or sanctions for “declining to celebrate or officiate at a marriage or commitment ceremony that falls outside the definition of marriage provided in this code.”
The measure challenges the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2015 ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges, which legalized same-sex marriage nationwide.
“Private citizens and organizations are not bound by the Fourteenth Amendment or by the Supreme Court’s purported interpretation of the Fourteenth Amendment in Obergefell v. Hodges,” the bill states.
Republican state Rep. Gino Bulso introduced the legislation.
“It was the U.S. Supreme Court on June the 26th of 2015 that overstepped its bounds and invented this ‘right’ to marriage of individuals of the same sex, despite there being no support whatsoever in the language of the 14th Amendment for that proposition,” Bulso said.
The bill now heads to the Republican-controlled state Senate, where it is currently under review in the Judiciary Committee.
Bulso referenced Tennessee’s 2006 Marriage Protection Amendment, which defined marriage as between one man and one woman and passed with 81 percent support.
“The overwhelming majority of Tennesseans already affirmed what we have known for all of history: marriage is between one man and one woman,” he said in a press release.
“This legislation protects religious liberty in the Volunteer State by clarifying that private citizens can never be forced to recognize any other definition,” Bulso added.
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