Editing Robert Byrd (section)

===LGBT rights===
Byrd strongly opposed Clinton's 1993 efforts to allow homosexuals to [[Don't ask, don't tell|serve in the military]] and supported efforts to limit [[Same-sex marriage in the United States|gay marriage]]. In 1996, before the passage of the [[Defense of Marriage Act]], he said, "The drive for same-sex marriage is, in effect, an effort to make a sneak attack on society by encoding this aberrant behavior in legal form before society itself has decided it should be legal. […] Let us defend the oldest institution, the institution of marriage between male and female as set forth in the [[Bible|Holy Bible]]".<ref name=":1">{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1996/09/11/us/senators-reject-both-job-bias-ban-and-gay-marriage.html?pagewanted=all |work=The New York Times |title=Senators Reject Both Job-Bias Ban And Gay Marriage |first=Eric |last=Schmitt |date=September 11, 1996 |access-date=May 22, 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130520195051/http://www.nytimes.com/1996/09/11/us/senators-reject-both-job-bias-ban-and-gay-marriage.html?pagewanted=all |archive-date=May 20, 2013 |url-status=live }}</ref>

Despite his previous position, he later stated his opposition to the [[Federal Marriage Amendment]] and argued that it was unnecessary because the states already had the power to ban gay marriages.<ref>[http://byrd.senate.gov/newsroom/news_june/marriage_amdt.html Robert Byrd Senate Office] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090104220045/http://byrd.senate.gov/newsroom/news_june/marriage_amdt.html |date=January 4, 2009 }}</ref> However, when the amendment came to the Senate floor, he was one of the two Democratic senators who voted in favor of [[cloture]].<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.hrc.org/voteno/files/060607_FMAvote.pdf|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101231132539/http://www.hrc.org/voteno/files/060607_FMAvote.pdf|archive-date=December 31, 2010 |url-status=dead|title=Human Rights Campaign |access-date=June 28, 2010}}</ref>