``What we're witnessing in America today is the flowering of the largest civil rights movement the country's had in a generation,''

``We have to show people who we are,'' he said. ``We've been badmouthed by religious zealots. We've been deprived by President Bush, and we have to show people that we're your friends, neighbors and family.''


``This country was founded on a revolution,'' he said. ``And this is a revolution, but it's a revolution of love.''

Civil unions grant couples most of the rights of state civil marriages, except the name, but provide none of the federal benefits of marriage, such as Social Security benefits.

"These are the desperate acts of a desperate president who is going to try and drag this country through a cultural war to jump-start a failing campaign," she said. "He is not acting as the uniter he promised to be. He is absolutely dividing here, and hoping to conquer. This is a huge distraction, because he has no answers to the real problems that impact and affect American lives."

"We think it is fair to ask during this debate how many legislators who are demonizing gay marriage have actually committed the most grievous possible injury to the institution they claim to want to protect," said Linda Perdue, president of the Indiana Stonewall Democrats.