SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - Gay rights advocates reveled in the moment after the Senate handed President Bush and his most conservative backers an embarrassing setback by voting to block a constitutional amendment that would have banned same-sex marriage.

But opponents of the Federal Marriage Amendment also acknowledged that with the House of Representatives and voters in 11 states set to take up the issue again, it's too early to declare victory. And conservatives vowed to use Wednesday's Senate outcome as ammunition in the upcoming election.

"The Republicans, at least some of them, have made the political calculation that this is to their benefit to raise," said Michael Adams, education director of the Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund. "We certainly hope today's vote might have a moderating influence on them to realize it's not the political wedge issue they wanted."

Gay rights organizations have made fighting the amendment their top priority since the president announced his support for it in late February in a speech that complained about "activist judges" on Massachusetts' top court.

The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court legalized gay marriage in that state, and took issue with San Francisco's renegade experiment in same-sex nuptials.

The amendment's defeat in the Senate was especially welcomed in San Francisco, where Mayor Gavin Newsom was pilloried by Republicans and many fellow Democrats alike this year for allowing more than 4,000 gay and lesbian couples to obtain marriage licenses.

After absorbing months of criticism, Newsom was more than happy to claim a little credit for the failure of the Republicans to gain even a simple majority in the Senate for the amendment. Wednesday's vote had been scheduled to inflict maximum damage on Democrats before they gather in Boston to formally declare John Kerry as their presidential candidate.

"What happened in San Francisco is we put a human face on this debate much earlier than the president and his handlers had anticipated. We also took a lot of the focus and attention away from Massachusetts, so they couldn't build on the momentum around the convention to embarrass Kerry," Newsom said. "This effort ended as it should have, and it was a major miscalculation."

Conservative groups who had championed a nationwide ban on gay marriage to counter recent legal victories by gays and lesbians insisted, however, that public opinion remains in their favor. But while polls show a solid majority of Americans are opposed to gay marriage, less than half want to amend the constitution to prohibit it.

"The senators cannot ignore the will of the American people and expect to remain in office," said Mathew D. Staver, president of Liberty Counsel, a Florida-based group that has tried to block same-sex marriage in Massachusetts and San Francisco. "The American voters who believe in traditional marriage will remember in November who failed to stand for marriage."

Six Republicans joined 43 Democrats and one independent in defeating the proposed amendment, which held that marriage within the United States "shall consist only of a man and a woman." Forty-eight senators voted to advance it.

2004-07-15     09:04:03 GMT