A state Senate committee voted along party lines on Thursday to approve a measure to codify same-sex marriage into state law.

Senate Bill 14 enacts the will of the voters on Amendment J, which struck down a 2006 constitutional amendment that banned same-sex marriage. Voters approved the 2024 ballot measure by nearly 30 percentage points.

The Senate bill strikes statutory language from 2006 tied to Amendment 43, which said marriage in Colorado is only between a man and a woman.

SB 14 instead defines marriage as “the legally recognized union of two individuals as partners in a personal relationship.”

The bill and Amendment J in 2024 were, in part, responses to concerns by Democrats and other advocates about the current direction of the U.S. Supreme Court.

Obergefell v. Hodges, which the U.S. Supreme Court decided in a 5-4 vote in 2015, concluded that a fundamental right to marry is guaranteed to same-sex couples.

The court is a different one today, said bill sponsor Sen. Sonja Jaquez Lewis, D-Longmont.

“Folks are afraid out there,” she said. 

Committee chair Sen. Mike Weissman, D-Aurora, added, “We are in an era when states, through statutes and constitutional law, do have to protect the basic rights of people.”

He said having a marriage recognized legally has to rank high among those rights.

Amendment J overturned a previous Colorado constitutional amendment that voters approved in 2006. That amendment was rendered null and void by Obergefell in 2015. But the 2006 law remained on Colorado’s books.

Fears among Democrats and advocates that the conservative court would undo Obergefell grew after the court’s Roe v. Wade decision in 2022.

Voters in three states — Colorado, California and Hawaii — all passed ballot measures last year to ensure same-sex marriage remains legal in their states. Colorado and Hawaii’s measures amended their constitutions; California’s was statutory. As of 2022, 35 states still had laws saying same-sex marriage is illegal on their books. 

Following Obergefell, Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas appeared to suggest that the court should reconsider the 2015 ruling. 

The move to overturn Obergefell is underway in some places. This week, the Idaho legislature passed a resolution to ask the Supreme Court to reconsider its ruling. The move is being championed by a group called Mass Resistance that is pushing for similar resolutions in North Dakota, Montana, Michigan, Iowa, and Kansas. The group says nine other states are considering it. 

No one testified against SB 14 in Thursday’s hearing. It passed on a 3-2 party-line vote and now heads to the full Senate.