he planned to introduce a bill to grant same-sex couples the right to marry. While the bill did not contemplate adoption, most LGBT organizations in Portugal supported the measure as an important step. In March 2009, Jorge Lacão, the Secretary of State for the Presidency of the Council of Ministers, confirmed that the Socialist Government intended to legalize same-sex marriage if re-elected in 2009. Manuela Ferreira Leite, the leader of the conservative Social Democratic Party, expressed her opposition to the recognition of same-sex marriage. In May 2009, a grassroots movement, the Movement for Equality in Access to Civil Marriage (), was formed to campaign for the proposed same-sex marriage law. It attracted the support of several Portuguese celebrities, including Nobel Prize winner José Saramago and the Mayor of Lisbon, António Costa. In October 2009, the newly re-elected Sócrates made an assurance that the Socialist Party would move ahead with its campaign promise of legalizing same-sex marriage. The proposition received strong support from the Left Bloc, with its parliamentary leader, Francisco Louçã, presenting his own bill to legalize same-sex marriage. In mid-October 2009, Lacão said it was likely that same-sex marriage would be legalised in early 2010. On 3 November 2009, José Ribeiro e Castro, a deputy from the CDS – People's Party, called for a referendum but the Prime Minister, the Socialist Party and the Left Bloc rejected the idea. On 4 November 2009, Francisco Assis, the parliamentary leader of the Socialist Party, said that the same-sex marriage bill would be voted on soon and confirmed that the bill would not allow same-sex couples to adopt children. The government gave its official approval to the same-sex marriage bill on 17 December 2009. On 8 January 2010, after a debate which included the intervention of Prime Minister Sócrates, the Assembly of the Republic passed the bill in first reading by 126 votes to 97, and rejected bills introduced by the Left Bloc and the Green Party, as well as a measure to create civil unions submitted by the PSD. The Constitutional Affairs Committee approved the bill on 10 February, and it passed its final parliamentary vote on 11 February. The legislation was sent to President Aníbal Cavaco Silva on 24 February 2010. On 13 March 2010, Cavaco Silva asked the Constitutional Court to verify whether the bill was constitutional. On 8 April 2010, the Constitutional Court ruled (11–2) for the constitutionality