With a 5-2 vote, the state Senate Judiciary Committee passed Assembly Bill 849, the Religious Freedom and Civil Marriage Protection Act, on Tuesday. The bill, authored by Assemblymember Mark Leno, D-San Francisco and Assembly Speaker Fabian Núñez, D-Los Angeles, would change the Family Code to read that marriage is between “two persons,” rather than between a man and a woman, but would not require clergy opposed to same-sex marriages to perform them.

Through a procedural move called “gut and amend,” the language of the bill was placed into the body of a marine fisheries research bill that has already passed the Assembly. Leno stripped the bill of its contents and inserted the language of AB 19, the previous version of the Religious Freedom and Civil Marriage Protection Act that failed in the Assembly last month by four votes.

The bill now heads to the Senate Appropriations Committee after legislators return from summer recess on Aug. 15. If it then passes a floor vote in the Senate, the bill moves back to the Assembly for a vote, giving the bill one more chance to get to the governor’s desk before the 2005 legislative session ends in September.

“Because civil rights battles are never won in a day, we must move this issue forward whenever we can,” Leno said. “This is the year to do it. We came so close to victory in June. With a few more months to make our case, the LGBT Legislative Caucus believes we will prevail.”

The California State Conference of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), the United Farm Workers, the National Organization of Women, among others, have lent their support to the bill.

In California, 30 cities and counties have passed resolutions supporting marriage equality. Most recently was the Los Angeles City Council, which unanimously voted to adopt a motion in support of “any legislative or administrative action that would create marriage equality for same-sex couples in California,” Equality California said.

Senators Joseph Dunn, Gilbert Cedillo, Martha Escutia, Liz Figueroa and Sheila Kuehl, all Democrats, voted for the AB 849 in the Senate Judiciary Committee. Dick Ackerman and Bill Morrow, both Republicans, voted against it.

Randy Thomasson, head of the Campaign for Children and Families, which opposes the bill, testified before the state Senate on Tuesday that the Legislature was not the proper venue to legalize same-sex marriage, and said legalization should be put to voters to decide. Thomasson is spearheading a voter initiative drive to get a measure placed on the ballot that would amend the California Constitution to specifically define marriage as between a man and a woman.