TRENTON, N.J. (RNS) After a month in legislative limbo, a bill to allow same-sex marriage in New Jersey will get a vote in the state Senate on Thursday (Jan. 7), Senate President Richard Codey said.

The decision sets up another dramatic day in Trenton as supporters concede they won’t know if the measure will pass until the votes are tallied. Senators will make a decision a month after Codey called off a vote when sponsors worried there wasn’t enough support — and a week after Assembly Speaker Joseph Roberts said his chamber won’t vote on gay marriage until it passes in the Senate.

“Given the intensely personal nature of this issue, I think the people of this state deserve the right to a formal debate on the Senate floor,” Codey said.

With many legislators refusing to say where they stand, state Sen. Loretta Weinberg, a sponsor, said the vote forces them to “stand up and be counted on how they feel about equal rights.”

“They can’t be hesitant anymore,” Weinberg said. “They have to come to the realization that we were elected to take sometimes difficult stands, but we were not elected to only worry about the next election.”

Senate Majority Leader and incoming Senate President Stephen Sweeney, a Democrat, declined to say how he would vote, but said gay marriage supporters “have made a very strong case about civil rights — one that’s hard to ignore, to be perfectly honest with you.”

Roberts said the gay marriage divide in the Assembly is “very, very, very close,” and his colleagues had been reluctant to vote on the bill only to see it go down in the Senate.

Outgoing Gov. Jon Corzine has pledged to sign the bill if it passes both chambers, saying “marriage equality is an idea whose time has come.” Gov.-elect Chris Christie, who opposes gay marriage, takes office Jan. 19.