DENVER (AP) – Two Colorado lawmakers picked up where they left off last year, pushing for a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage as the new Congress gets down to business.

“We need to continue with the momentum from the election. Support has grown in the Senate and the nation,” Republican Sen. Wayne Allard said after he reintroduced the amendment.

Republican Rep. Marilyn Musgrave, who sponsored the amendment in the House last year, plans to reintroduce it this year as well, spokesperson Aaron Johnson said.

Last year, the Marriage Protection Amendment failed in both the Senate and House. It got only 48 of the 60 Senate votes needed to overcome procedural hurdles. It failed in the House 227-186, well short of the two-thirds majority needed.

Since then, however, referendums defining marriage as between a man and a woman passed by large margins in 13 states, Allard said.

Five senators who opposed the constitutional amendment last year were defeated or did not seek re-election, and Republicans gained five seats in the Senate to take a 55-44 majority.

Allard believes the amendment will pass, in spite of doubts expressed by President Bush.

“Right now we have all the leadership on the bill on the Republican side. A fifth of the Senate has signed on for sponsorship,” Allard said.

Conservative groups made clear they will be pressing Bush to support the amendment by quickly applauding Allard’s action.

“It is encouraging to see the Senate’s swift action to preserve marriage in the first month of the 109th Congress. With dozens of challenges to state marriage laws, as well as a federal court challenge to the Defense of Marriage Act, the stakes have never been higher in the battle to protect marriage,” said James Dobson, chair of the Colorado Springs-based Focus on the Family.

Allard, meanwhile, said the measure isn’t anti-gay. “I am not trying to change their lifestyle,” he said, simply trying to rein in legislating by the courts.

“The voice of the American people is being robbed from them because of the way the courts are acting,” he said.

States would still be free to legalize civil unions or domestic partnerships, he said.

Nicki Tait of Boulder Pride, which campaigns for GLBT rights, called Allard’s position “a shrewd attack, but it is still a personal attack because it is not validating my relationship.”

Offering only domestic partnerships to same-sex couples would be unfair because they would not convey the full benefits of marriage, she said.

Marriage rights guarantee that couples can share insurance benefits, visit each other when hospitalized and other privileges.

Michael Huttner, executive director of the liberal ProgressNow.org, said Allard should find more important things to work on.

“With Colorado ranked the 48th worst out of the 50 states in the amount of federal dollars it receives, Sen. Allard should drop his ideological pursuit and focus on Colorado and what it needs for his first piece of legislation this session,” said Huttner.