State senators in North Dakota voted down a measure on Thursday calling for the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn its decision that established a national right to same-sex marriage, an issue that has divided the Republicans who control that legislative chamber.
The vote came weeks after the state’s House of Representatives passed the resolution, and was part of a nationwide push by some conservatives to reopen a cultural battleground that many believed was settled.
The North Dakota legislation, like a similarly worded measure that passed the Idaho House of Representatives in January, would not have immediately changed the legality of same-sex marriage, which the Supreme Court established across the country in 2015 in Obergefell v. Hodges. But the willingness of Republicans in some states to revisit the issue signaled a broader political shift at a time when the Trump administration and conservative lawmakers are also seeking to limit official recognition of transgender identity.
Legislation condemning the Obergefell decision was also introduced this year in Michigan, Montana and South Dakota, though none of those measures have advanced out of committees. In Idaho, where the House passed its resolution, the state’s Senate has not taken it up.
The debate in North Dakota hearkened back to the early 2000s, before the Supreme Court decision, when same-sex marriage was debated fiercely in the states, leading to bans in some places and laws allowing same-sex couples to wed in others.
State Representative Bill Tveit, a Republican who sponsored the North Dakota resolution, cited the Bible, state laws and legal opinions when he made his case. The North Dakota Catholic Conference was among the organizations that spoke in support of the resolution.
“It’s past time for the good citizens to speak their displeasure with this Supreme Court decision, and call for restoration of the definition of marriage as only of the legal union between a man and woman,” Mr. Tveit said. He added that “if same-sex couples desire a collaborative union of sort, or a legal bonding, they must call it anything but marriage.”
Gay and lesbian North Dakotans urged lawmakers to vote down the measure, which some of them described as an attack on their identities and families.
“When our legislature considers resolutions such as this, I have to ask myself over and over again, ‘Why am I staying here?’” Laura Balliet, a state worker who is in a same-sex marriage, told lawmakers. “I do not feel wanted here. I don’t feel welcome. I feel like I’m being judged because of who I am.”
The North Dakota measure exposed disagreements among Republicans, even some who initially supported the idea. State Representative Matthew Ruby, a Republican who voted for the resolution in the House last month, said he regretted his vote and testified against the measure in the Senate.
“What does this measure do, other than send a message that your marriage isn’t valid and you’re not welcome?” asked Mr. Ruby, who said his prior vote had hurt members of his family and damaged the trust of soldiers he had served with. “Even if you believe that their marriage isn’t the same, is that a message that we should be sending or need to be sending?”
An organization based in Massachusetts called MassResistance has pressed for the resolutions in Idaho and North Dakota.
A Marquette Law School poll from October found that 65 percent of American adults supported the Supreme Court’s decision allowing same-sex couples to marry, including 83 percent of Democrats and 47 percent of Republicans. Polling shows that public opinion has shifted drastically in favor of same-sex marriage over the last 30 years, one of the most dramatic changes on any issue in that period.
Since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, legal scholars have said that the same-sex marriage ruling may also be vulnerable. Two of the court’s conservative justices, Clarence Thomas and Samuel A. Alito Jr., have suggested that it should be reconsidered, and the idea has gained traction among some elected Republicans.
But Democrats and some Republicans have moved to expand legal protections for same-sex couples in recent years. In 2022, former President Joseph R. Biden Jr. signed into law a bipartisan measure that mandated federal recognition for same-sex marriages and prohibited states from denying the validity of out-of-state marriages based on sex, race or ethnicity.
Kelly Armstrong, now North Dakota’s governor, was among the Republican members of Congress who joined Democrats to pass that law. A spokesman for Mr. Armstrong did not immediately respond Thursday to a request for comment.
Amy Harmon and Ruth Igielnik contributed reporting.
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