48-50. That was the vote today by the Senate on a cloture motion to proceed with a constitutional amendment on marriage. Supporters would have had to obtain 60 votes to advance the measure. Read about the vote here in an article from the Wall Street Journal (subscription required).
Also, two very interesting items related to the topic:
Benefitslink.com has posted a Technical Information Release 04-17 from the Massachusetts Department of Revenue entitled “Massachusetts Tax Issues Associated with Same-[Gender] Marriages.”
Veritude.com has this article–“The Ripple Effect of Same-Gender Marriages in Massachusetts“–which discusses the benefits implications of recent developments and also provides a link to a white paper by the law firm of Posternak Blankstein & Lund LLP in Boston discussing a potentially new area of legal exposure relating to benefits.