INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — Gay marriage supporters in Indiana
said Tuesday they are forming a coalition to build support for their
cause following high-profile fights over the issue at the Statehouse and
in the courts.
Hoosiers Unite for Marriage is planning to launch
Wednesday. Group director Kyle Megrath said it’s "a natural progression
from all the momentum" related to the proposed constitutional ban on gay
marriage in the state.
"The objectives are really to increase Hoosier support for the freedom to marry," Megrath said.

The
American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana will be part of the coalition
along with Liberty Indiana and the national group Freedom to Marry.
One
of their first moves will be to send Attorney General Greg Zoeller
petitions asking him to drop his backing of the state’s gay marriage
ban. Megrath said he has not determined the number of signatures he
would like to send Zoeller.
The group’s launch comes just days
after the Indiana Republican Party approved a platform that supports
defining marriage as between one man and one woman.
Voting on the
issue, which took place among roughly 1,500 delegates at the Republican
convention this past weekend in Fort Wayne, exposed some clear divisions
within the party. But it also revealed there is strong support among
Republicans for defining marriage as being between one man and one
woman.
The new coalition will be nonprofit and won’t support
legislation or political candidates, Megrath said. Instead, he said,
members will look to spread support for gay marriage through community
meetings, petitions and other activities.
Gay marriage supporters
won a partial victory earlier this year when they kept a proposed
constitutional ban on gay marriage off the ballot for this November. But
the legislative maneuvering on the issue hardly amounted to widespread
support for gay marriage.
Most lawmakers who voted to keep the
issue off the ballot said they were concerned the measure went too far
by also barring any future approval of civil unions.
Because
lawmakers removed the civil unions ban from the proposal, they also
reset the clock on the state’s lengthy constitutional amendment process,
making 2016 the soonest the measure could appear on the ballot.