Enoch Lankford, pastor of the nondenominational Restoration Church in Dickson, Tenn., leads a group of ministers from the Tennessee Pastors Network in prayer against the transgender restroom bill Monday, April 18, 2016, at Legislative Plaza. (RICHARD LOCKER/NEWS SENTINEL)

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By Richard Locker of the Knoxville News Sentinel

NASHVILLE — The House sponsor of a controversial bill that would require students in public K-12 and higher education institutions to use the restroom that corresponds with their sex at birth is delaying action on the bill until next year.

Rep. Susan Lynn, R-Mount Juliet, told reporters Monday she plans on effectively killing her own bill with the purpose of studying the issue further.

"I have learned that our school districts are largely following what the bill says," she said. "I am still absolutely 100 percent in support of maintaining the privacy of all students. But I'm going to roll the bill over until next year so we can work on those issues."

Hedy Weinberg, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Tennessee, said after Lynn's action that her organization is "gratified that Representative Susan Lynn heeded the extensive opposition to this bill from all corners of the state and decided to take this discriminatory and harmful legislation off notice. This measure would have had a devastating financial impact on the state, let alone the damage that it would have caused vulnerable students in Tennessee. Today's move helps ensure that every child in Tennessee will be treated with respect and dignity. We will remain vigilant to ensure that all Tennessee children are treated equally under the law."

Family Action Council of Tennessee President David Fowler, the bill's leading proponent outside the Legislature, issued a statement thanking Lynn and Sen. Mike Bell, the two legislative sponsors, for "efforts in past weeks in the face of consistent opposition from the governor's office and others, but we join the thousands of parents across the state who are profoundly disappointed that we are at this point in the process.

"Rep. Lynn has decided not to proceed with a bill that would have simply protected the privacy of the children they have entrusted to our public schools. We are grateful for the legislators who said they would take the bill from Rep. Lynn this year and continue to push it forward; however, it was not to be. We trust that one of them will do so next year. If so, we stand ready to assist, even as we have tried to do on the legislation this year.

"In the meantime, we would encourage citizens to monitor the policies of their local school systems and demand that their schools defend the privacy of students if threatened with lawsuits, as has already happened with one local school system."

Gov. Bill Haslam had expressed concerns about the bill, particularly the potential loss of federal education funding. He also said he had heard from no local school system about problems with current law.

The announcement comes as competing groups descended on Capitol Hill on Monday to continue the battle over the bill, while a panel of senators delayed taking action on the controversial legislation.

About 30 pastors from the conservative Tennessee Pastors Network joined the head of the Family Action Council of Tennessee at the State Capitol to show their support for the bill.

The pastors stood behind Fowler, a Republican state senator, at a Legislative Plaza news conference in which he downplayed the potential loss of convention business and federal education funding and corporate opposition to the bill. Afterward, the pastors prayed and walked upstairs to sing the children's Sunday school song "The B-I-B-L-E."

House Bill 2414/Senate Bill 2387 requires students in public elementary and secondary schools and colleges and universities to use the schools' restrooms, locker and dressing rooms of their birth gender and not their current gender identity.

Fowler said he was delivering to the governor's office letters in support of the bill from about a dozen ministers who he said represent about 22,000 church members.

Moments later, transgender students and their families delivered petitions they said had more than 67,000 signatures on them urging lawmakers not to pass HB 2414.

Students Henry Seaton and Jennifer Guenst delivered the petitions to the governor's office, along with a series of postcards that included personal messages from Tennesseans across the state opposing the legislation. They said nearly 6,000 of the signers identified themselves as clergy or people of faith when signing.

Fowler said, "We come together today not to criticize those people and business leaders who oppose House Bill 2414. Though we disagree with their views, we cannot help but admire the few who appear to be willing to put their principles and their conscience above matters of mere economics. In fact, today we call upon our legislators and governor to make that same kind of principled stand relative to the protection of the young people who attend our public schools and colleges when it comes to intimate settings like bathrooms, locker rooms and showers."

Fowler also pointed out differences between the Tennessee bill and a broader North Carolina law that has attracted national attention and which applies to restrooms at public facilities. It also goes further and prohibits North Carolina towns and cities from enacting their own anti-discrimination ordinances to protect the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community.

"Ours only applies to the bathrooms and locker rooms in our public schools and colleges that may be used by young people," Fowler said.

The transgender students were joined by representatives from the ACLU of Tennessee, the Tennessee Equality Project, the Tennessee Transgender Political Coalition, and Human Rights Campaign.

"I'm a boy — I live my life as a boy, my friends know me as a boy, my parents accept me as a boy. I shouldn't have to use the teacher's bathroom because some politicians feel uncomfortable with who I am," said Seaton, a senior at Beech High School in Sumner County. "This drastic bill would legalize bullying and stigmatize and humiliate transgender students like me. That's not what laws should do."

The Senate sponsor of the bill, Sen. Mike Bell, R-Riceville, earlier had deferred action on the bill in the Senate Finance Committee until at least today, the day it was scheduled for House Finance Committee review.

The news conference by the pastors opened the final three or four days of the General Assembly's 2016 session, which has been dominated by similar "culture war" issues. Monday evening on the House floor, the East Tennessee sponsor of a bill designating the Bible as the "official state book" of Tennessee was expected to serve formal notice of his attempt to override Gov. Haslam's veto of the bill. The actual override attempt probably won't occur on the House floor until Wednesday.

Also, the governor is still trying to decide whether to approve or veto a third controversial bill, giving counselors authority to deny their mental health services to people if serving them would violate their "sincerely held principles."

Tennessean Staff Writer Joel Ebert contributed to this story.