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WASHINGTON - The House approved a bill Thursday to strip the federal courts of jurisdiction over same-sex marriage cases, despite warnings by opponents that the measure is unconstitutional and would open the floodgates to efforts preventing judges from ruling on other issues, from gun control to abortion.

With strong backing from the Bush administration, the Marriage Protection Act was adopted 233 to 194. Utah Republican Reps. Rob Bishop and Chris Cannon and Democrat Jim Matheson voted for the legislation. However, the bill is likely to face strong opposition in the Senate, where some Republicans joined with Democrats last week to block a proposed constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage.

GOP sponsors described the bill as a fallback measure that would prevent federal courts from ordering states to recognize gay marriages that are permitted by other states. The bill, drafted by Rep. John Hostettler, R-Ind., would prevent such a ruling by denying all federal courts, including the Supreme Court, jurisdiction to rule on the constitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act, a 1996 federal law that says that no state has to recognize same-sex unions established in any other state.

Some social conservatives contend it is only a matter of time before a federal court attempts to force the federal government or the other 49 states to recognize the same-sex marriages that Massachusetts began sanctioning in mid-May.

Republican House members argued on the floor that individual states should be allowed to defend their own marriage laws against unbridled judicial power.

Rep. James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., declared that marriage ''is under attack,'' referring to the Massachusetts state court decision permitting same-sex marriage. Sensenbrenner said the legislation is needed to prevent Massachusetts law from being imposed throughout the country.

''People who objected to the constitutional amendment said the definition of marriage is a matter that should be left up to the states. That's exactly what this bill does,'' said Hostettler's spokesman, Michael Jahr.

But the bill's congressional opponents, several constitutional scholars and a wide array of civil liberties groups called it a nearly unprecedented attack on the constitutional separation of powers between the judicial, legislative and executive branches of government.

Democrats accused the bill's sponsors of using the issue as a smokescreen before the national conventions and the run up to the November election.

''Instead of addressing the real concerns faced by American families, the leadership of this House has decided to throw its political base some red meat,'' said Rep. James McGovern, D-Mass.

''They couldn't amend the Constitution last week so they're trying to desecrate and circumvent the Constitution this week,'' he added.

In a letter to lawmakers this week, Chai Feldblum, a professor at Georgetown University Law Center, said the last time that Congress passed a law stripping the Supreme Court of authority to hear a constitutional challenge was in 1868, when it feared that the court might invalidate the military Reconstruction of the South after the Civil War.