WASHINGTON – A constitutional amendment to ban flag desecration died in a Senate cliffhanger Tuesday, a single vote short of the support needed to send it to the states for ratification and four months before voters elect a new Congress.

The 66-34 vote fell one short of the two-thirds majority required to approve a constitutional amendment and submit it to the states for ratification. The House approved the measure 286-130 last year.

Democratic Washington Sens. Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell voted with the majority against the amendment.

Cantwell said she understands the desire to protect the flag, but added: “The strength of our nation lies in our ability to tolerate dissent even when we do not agree with what is being expressed. While I do not condone it, there is simply no more basic or potent statement of freedom of expression than the destruction of a national symbol.”

As expected, three Republicans – Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, Robert Bennett of Utah, and Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island – voted against the amendment, and 14 Democrats voted for it.

The proposed amendment, sponsored by Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, read: “The Congress shall have power to prohibit the physical desecration of the flag of the United States.”

It represented Congress’ response to Supreme Court rulings in 1989 and 1990 that burning and other desecrations of the flag are protected as free speech by the First Amendment to the Constitution.

Senate supporters said the flag amounts to a national monument in cloth that represents freedom and the sacrifice of American troops.

“Countless men and women have died defending that flag,” said Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., closing two days of debate. “It is but a small humble act for us to defend it.”

Opponents said the amendment would violate the First Amendment right to free speech. And some Democrats complained that majority Republicans were exploiting people’s patriotism for political advantage in the midterm elections.

Polls show that most Americans want flag-desecration outlawed.

The last time the Senate considered the amendment, in 2000, it fell four votes short of what was needed. Both sides predicted rightly before Tuesday’s vote that it would get more support.