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PHOENIX — The effort to put what would amount to a constitutional ban on gay marriage on the ballot came up short of the votes it needed to pass the state Senate on Wednesday.

But that doesn't mean the move to define marriage as between a man and a woman is dead.

When it became apparent the proposal had just 15 votes, one fewer than it needed, Phoenix Republican Sen. Linda Gray — a supporter — switched her vote in a procedural move that will allow her to request the measure be brought back for reconsideration in the waning days of the legislative session.

That would give another supporter, Sen. Karen Johnson, a Mesa Republican who is on vacation, time to come back and vote.

The surprise roll call Wednesday, which had been weeks in coming, quickly spun into a heated debate over marriage and "social norms."

It took place even though supporters knew it would be difficult to rally enough votes with Johnson absent.

Three other senators, including Tucson Democrat Victor Soltero, were absent, but opponents of the measure say all three are against it.

Winning enough support for the measure has been an ongoing challenge for supporters in both the House and the Senate since the bill was introduced, with legislators often absent or missing from the floor when their votes were needed.

The bill finally passed the House in May and had been awaiting a vote in the Senate.

Supporters blamed Johnson for the failure, without naming her directly. Johnson, however, in a Senate memo Monday, indicated she expected the marriage referendum vote to come on Friday and would "make a special effort" to return for it even though she planned to be gone through July 10.

The mostly party-line vote included only one Republican "no" vote and one Democrat who chose not to vote although she was in the building. Sen. Carolyn Allen, a Scottsdale Republican, voted against the measure, saying, "I'm getting real tired of all the games going on on the floor."

"I'm opposed to us continuing to play with our (state) constitution," said Allen, who added that she supported current state statute banning gay marriage.

But Republican supporters say the ballot effort is necessary since "activist judges" could overturn the state ban on gay marriage. Although courts here have upheld the law, a court decision in California allowing gay marriage there puts our law in danger, they said.

"What's going to happen is we're going to have homosexual couples from Arizona that are going to go to California and be married," said Sen. Ron Gould, a Lake Havasu Republican. "They're going to return to Arizona and they're going to challenge our state law."

Sen. Rebecca Rios, an Apache Junction Democrat, left the floor for the vote, reappearing after the measure had failed. She said she was protesting the issue. "This is simply political game-playing by the Republicans," Rios said later. "I'm not feeding into it."

The Senate's 30 members include two openly gay lawmakers, Sen. Ken Cheuvront, a Phoenix Democrat, and Sen. Paula Aboud, a Tucson Democrat. Cheuvront said it's been "enlightening" to see which members lobbied hard to pass the measure.

"We've realized who our friends are and who our foes are," he said. "It tells us what you think of us."

Among those who voted in favor of sending the measure to the ballot was Senate President Tim Bee, a Tucson Republican who sponsored the original effort early this year. On an initial vote to bring the bill to the floor, Bee voted against doing so.

"It's not over until it's over," said Cathi Herrod, president of the Center for Arizona Policy, a socially conservative lobbying group that drafted the measure.