Senate rejects proposal to replace ‘husband and wife’ language in state code with ‘spouse’
Senate Bill 22-64, which would have replaced gendered references to "husband and wife" in the Century Code with the gender-neutral term "spouse," failed on final passage after committee opposition citing a state constitutional provision.
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Senator Larson, speaking for the committee, said the bill sought to replace references to "husband and wife" with "spouse" throughout specified sections of the North Dakota Century Code. Larson noted that Article 11, Section 28 of the state constitution defines marriage as "the legal union between a man and a woman" and argued the code should remain consistent with that constitutional language; the committee recommended a do-not-pass vote.
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