A hunt for middle ground

A compromise constitutional amendment that would ban gay marriage but also establish same-sex civil unions appears to be gaining support as Massachusetts lawmakers reconvene today four weeks after their earlier constitutional convention adjourned in chaos and deadlock.

Senate President Robert E. Travaglini, a lead sponsor of the compromise amendment, expressed confidence yesterday that the proposal will win the necessary 101 votes when the lawmakers resume their emotionally charged debate in the House chamber. The convention recessed Feb. 12 after three amendment proposals fell short of a majority by a few votes.

"I'm growing increasingly confident," Travaglini said in Washington, D.C., where he and House Speaker Thomas M. Finneran, a cosponsor of the amendment, were leading a delegation of Beacon Hill lawmakers to meet with the state congressional delegation and raise campaign cash.

"People who were noes are now maybes," he said. "People who were maybes are now yeses, and there is movement that is beneficial to reaching a consensus." A similarly worded amendment sponsored by Travaglini in February failed by seven votes.

"We are working it, and we feel as if we are making progress," Finneran said. "But it's far too early to say anything definitive."

However, lawmakers who met with Travaglini before he left Boston said the Senate leader confided to them that he has the votes to win the amendment's passage.

"It's a done deal," said one Senate colleague after conferring with Travaglini. The Senate leader, said those lawmakers, seems intent on ending the debate that has for several months brought most other business on Beacon Hill to a halt. It also sparked a national debate on the issue and became an issue in the presidential campaign.

The proposed amendment would define marriage as solely the union of a man and a woman, and establish civil unions that would "provide entirely the same benefits, protections, rights, and responsibilities that are afforded to couples married under Massachusetts law." If it clears the Legislature this year, it would have to be approved next year to qualify for the November 2006 ballot.

The predictions by Travaglini and other lawmakers followed a decision by some legislators who support gay marriage to vote for the compromise amendment. Yesterday, 48 lawmakers who support gay marriage met to plot strategy. In an emotional, closed-door session, Representative Elizabeth Malia expressed much of the group's frustration, at one point referring to Finneran as a "son of a bitch" and attacking him for forcing the lawmakers to vote for what they consider an antigay amendment, according to lawmakers who were present. In an interview later, Malia would say only, "I may have called him a son of a gun."

Some gay marriage supporters might support the compromise as part of a strategy to block other proposals to ban gay marriage or, in another view, to eventually block the compromise from reaching the 2006 ballot.

One strategy would take advantage of the procedures for today's convention, which will require lawmakers to vote at least twice on the compromise amendment. First, gay marriage supporters would support the amendment and vote against attempts to substitute harsher proposals opposing gay marriage. Then, gay marriage supporters would withdraw their support when the Legislature has to take another vote to send the measure to the 2005-2006 constitutional convention. If the measure fails on that vote it could not reach the 2006 ballot.

Gay marriage foes, suspicious of their rivals' motives, expressed concern that Travaglini may be conspiring with gay marriage advocates to block any amendment from reaching the voters.

"That is a real concern," said Ronald A. Crews, spokesman for the Coalition for Marriage, which opposes gay marriage. "If he is going to do that in order to kill it, that brings into question what his motives are. Is this all a sham?"

Crews said his group would be comfortable with another amendment that defined marriage as being between a man and a woman, established civil unions, but allows the Legislature to define the "nature and extent" of civil unions. The proposal is sponsored by Representative Paul J.P. Loscocco, a Holliston Republican.

Some lawmakers and gay activists complain that the Loscocco amendment does not provide a guarantee of civil unions.

The Supreme Judicial Court's ruling in November legalizing gay marriage had brought national and international media coverage of the convention, as lawmakers struggled to deal with the impact of the court opinion. Since then, much of the national focus has been on San Francisco and other areas of the country that were issuing gay marriage licenses.

The approach of the convention brought some strong lobbying from the various factions. Gay activists held a candlelight vigil last night at the State House. At the State House, the simmering tension in the African-American community over the gay marriage issue erupted at a press conference. The session, organized by the Family Research Council, turned into a shouting match between a handful of gay marriage supporters and black pastors who reject the idea that gay marriage is a civil rights issue.

The half-dozen ministers argued that unlike race, homosexuality is a changeable lifestyle and that gays and lesbians don't deserve the same rights and protections as racial minorities.

"There is no scientific data that says that anybody is born that way, and because they could not substantiate it through science, they've jumped on the civil rights bandwagon," said the Rev. Gerald Agee of the Friendship Christian Church in Oakland.

The Rev. Gregory Daniels of the United Truth and Change Church in Chicago said that "if the KKK was opposing same-sex marriage, Reverend Daniels would ride with them."

"I don't think the suffering compares to the brutality that our people have suffered."

But after reporters had asked a handful of questions, the Rev. Irene Monroe, a doctoral candidate at Harvard Divinity School, stood up to denounce the ministers for creating "a hierarchy of oppression." Monroe resisted attempts by representatives of the Family Research Council to silence her, and the debate soon spilled into the hallway.

This week, NAACP chairman Julian Bond urged Massachusetts legislators to reject a ban on gay marriage. While declining to take a position on the amendment, Bond connected the fight on Beacon Hill to the civil rights struggle.

Scott Greenberger of the Globe staff contributed to this report.