President Bush asked Congress Tuesday to pass a constitutional amendment to define marriage as a union exclusively between one man and one woman.

In an announcement meant to address the heightening national controversy over gay marriage, Bush said legislators must amend the federal constitution to protect the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) from those states that have recently begun to allow marriages between same-sex couples.

“Activist courts have left the people with one recourse. If we’re to prevent the meaning of marriage from being changed forever, our nation must enact a constitutional amendment to protect marriage in America,” Bush said.

In Massachusetts, state Supreme Court judges recently ruled that the state must allow gay marriage. City officials in San Francisco have issued thousands of marriage licenses to gay couples in the last few days.

Bush argued that state defiance of DOMA requires federal intervention in order to preserve the traditional meaning of the “most fundamental institution of civilization.”

“Marriage cannot be severed from its cultural, religious and natural roots without weakening the good influence of society. Government, by recognizing and protecting marriage, serves the interests of all,” Bush said.

Although the amendment would ban gay marriage across America, it would still allow states individual discretion about how they wish to legally recognize same-sex couples.

To be enacted, the amendment would have to pass two-thirds majority in each house of Congress before gaining approval by three-fourths of state legislatures.

Bush’s announcement garnered both criticism and praise as the national debate over gay marriage continues to boil over.

“Our founding fathers would be appalled by the president’s efforts to use our Constitution as a weapon to divide our nation and discriminate,” openly gay U.S. Rep. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis., said in a release. “Marriage has always been a matter for the states, and it should remain so.”

But Rev. Louis P. Sheldon, chairman of the Traditional Values Coalition, supported the president’s move, saying it “comes right in the nick of time to save America’s most important institution.”

“It is good to hear the clear, sound reasoning of President Bush above the wave of deception in the courts,” Rev. Sheldon said in a release.

On the same day of Bush’s announcement, a Wisconsin Assembly Committee voted 6-1 to pass a state constitutional amendment proposal defining marriage as between a man and a woman.

Supporters of the amendment claim Wisconsin must clarify the definition of marriage to prevent the courts from deciding the question of gay marriage for the state.

“Amending the constitution would protect Wisconsin from what happened recently in Massachusetts, where the state’s high court essentially forced the Legislature to legalize marriage between persons of the same sex,” Julaine Appling, executive director of the Family Research Institute of Wisconsin, said in a release.

But some opponents to a ban on same-sex marriage claim that legislators are attacking the rights of gay couples in an effort to benefit politically.

“It’s despicable that Republican leaders are using lesbian and gay families as punching bags in an election-year attempt to shore up their far-right base,” Christopher Ott, executive director of Action Wisconsin, said in a release.