North Dakota Senate rejects controversial resolution to overturn same-sex marriage ruling

The North Dakota Senate voted down a resolution on Thursday that would have urged the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn the 2015 Obergefell v. Hodges case legalizing same-sex marriage. House Resolution 3013 passed the North Dakota house 52-40 in February. Attorney and veteran Laura Balliet said the resolution is useless at the national level as the Supreme Court will not act on it, but it does succeed in sending a judgmental message. The Wednesday hearing preceding the vote lasted two hours, full of emotional testimony opposing the House resolution. A room full of opponents of the resolution watched a livestream of the hearing, and could be heard laughing and expressing disgust when testimony from the handful of supporters of the resolution was heard. On Thursday, the Senate voted against the resolution 31-16, but it was not a roll call vote, meaning it did not identify how each lawmaker voted. Cody Schuler, the advocacy manager from ACLU of North Dakota, found it disappointing the blind vote was used, as North Dakotans won’t be able to tell how their senators voted. He said “this resolution was a bigoted and unpopular view on same-sex marriage and an affront to queer people in our state.”