Senate leans toward House form of bill

State senators are inclined to agree to the state House’s version of a marriage equality bill rather than take the debate into conference committee.

The House is expected to vote today on a bill that would allow gay couples to marry as soon as Dec. 2 but would broaden a religious exemption for churches and religious organizations that do not want to be involved in gay weddings. If the House approves the bill, it could be heard by the Senate on Tuesday.

Senators said Thursday that although they prefer their version of the bill, which contains a narrower religious exemption, they are inclined to take the House version, provided it is not amended further. If the Senate agrees to the House version Tuesday, it would go directly to Gov. Neil Abercrombie for his signature.

"That seems like the prevailing mood of the members I spoke to," said Sen. Clayton Hee (D, Heeia-Laie-Waia­lua), chairman of the Senate Judiciary and Labor Committee.

Hee said he is not pleased with the broader religious exemption in the House bill.

"However, having said that, it doesn’t detract from making second-class citizens first-class citizens," he said. "It doesn’t detract from bringing a class of people that have been discriminated against and treating them like everybody else."

Senate Democrats met in private caucus Thursday and heard from state Attorney General David Louie and William Hoshijo, executive director of the Hawaii Civil Rights Commission, about the differences between the House and Senate versions of the bill.

Both Louie and Hoshijo have cautioned lawmakers not to cripple the state’s public accommodations law with an overly broad religious exemption, since the law protects against discrimination by gender, ethnicity and race in addition to sexual orientation.

Both the Senate and House versions of the bill carve out an exemption to the public accommodations law for churches and other religious organizations, but the House exemption is broader, covering a wider range of religious groups and specifying that religious groups would not be required to provide goods, services, facilities or grounds for weddings or wedding celebrations that violate religious beliefs.

Senate Majority Leader Brickwood Galu­te­ria (D, Kaka­ako-McCully-Waikiki) said some senators have pointed questions about the House version but also appreciate the larger context.

"We do know that it’s about where we want it to be if we’re going to do anything," he said.

Many lawmakers who favor marriage equality privately fear that if the bill were to go to conference committee, the debate may spiral out of control, and the chances that a bill would pass in special session would diminish.

"We can’t let the good fall victim to the perfect," said Sen. Clarence Nishi­hara (D, Wai­pahu-Pearl City).

House leaders, meanwhile, prepared for another potentially grueling floor session today that could provide opponents of gay marriage their last chance to be heard. Lawmakers, as they did Wednesday, could push for amendments or force votes on procedural motions that would delay or effectively kill the bill.

House leaders have said they are confident that they have sufficient votes to pass the bill today and send it back to the Senate.