CONCORD, N.H. — New Hampshire lawmakers rejected a bill Wednesday that would have made their state legislature the first one to repeal a same-sex-marriage law, an action that the governor had promised to block.
The state House voted 211-116 to kill the measure, ending a push in the Legislature to rescind New Hampshire’s 2-year-old gay-marriage law. Nevertheless, both sides are pledging to continue fighting into the fall elections.
The Republican-backed bill called for repealing same-sex marriage in March 2013 and replacing it with a civil-unions law that had been in place in 2008 and 2009. Gay marriages occurring before the repeal took effect still would have been valid, but future gay unions would be civil unions. The bill also would have allowed voters to weigh in on the issue through a nonbinding November ballot question.
Tom Czapieo, 63, of Keene, watched the House debate from the gallery with his partner, Mike Bellrose, 61. Czapieo said he was surprised and thrilled by the vote, even though he and Bellrose have no immediate plans to marry.
“I was born this way,” he said. “I should have the right to marry who I want.”
