Thompson Backs Fla. Gay Marriage Ban

Republican presidential candidate Fred Thompson lauded a group in Florida for its effort to seek a statewide ban on same-sex marriages.

Speaking in Hollywood, Fla., to the Florida Family Policy Council, he said the controversy over the definition of marriage is "a totally judicially made problem," according to the Palm Beach Post. He also slammed judges who "make it up as they go along."

Florida Family Policy Council is trying to get a referendum issue on the 2008 Florida ballot defining marriage as a union between a man and a woman and forbidding recognition of any other type of union "that is treated as marriage or the substantial equivalent thereof."

Thompson, though, says the solution to the issue shouldn't be handled at the federal level. Rather than a federal constitutional amendment defining marriage, Thompson is calling for an amendment that would allow states to recognize same-sex marriages only if they are approved by voters or legislatures rather than judges. Such an amendment also would specify that no state would have to recognize a same-sex marriage approved in another state.