INDIANAPOLIS | A Senate committee voted Wednesday to amend the Indiana Constitution to ban gay marriage and civil unions, even as a new poll finds most Hoosiers oppose the amendment.

The Republican-controlled Senate Judiciary Committee voted along party lines to send House Joint Resolution 6 to the full Senate. If approved there, the amendment must be approved again by the 2013-14 General Assembly before the question could be submitted to voters.

State law has limited marriage to one man and one woman since 1984, but proponents of the amendment say "activist judges" may someday rule that law unconstitutional. An amendment ensures that can't happen, they say.

State Sen. Lonnie Randolph, D-East Chicago, said Indiana judges already have upheld the state's marriage law and said the legislature shouldn't be amending the constitution to have government telling Hoosiers how to live their lives.

The proposed amendment also would prohibit civil unions, saying "a legal status identical or substantially similar to that of marriage for unmarried individuals" shall not be recognized. An Illinois law permitting civil unions takes effect June 1.