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The measure, which would allow anyone to marry "any eligible person regardless of gender," passed 51 to 19 after about an hour and a half of debate. But the cheers that filled the viewing gallery were quickly tempered by the bill's uncertain future.

"It's off to the Senate now," Dennis Byrnes of Cranston, R.I., said to a fellow onlooker. Mr. Byrnes married his husband over the border in Massachusetts.

The Senate president, Teresa Paiva-Weed, is opposed to same-sex marriage, although she has committed to allow the Senate Judiciary Committee to take up the bill, which will most likely happen in the spring.

Supporters of the measure, including the speaker of the House, Gordon Fox, who is gay, hoped to capitalize on the apparent national momentum: voters in Maine, Maryland and Washington State approved same-sex marriage in referendums last November. Closer to home, advocates cited the election of new lawmakers who support same-sex marriage as a reason to put the issue in front of the General Assembly just two years after civil unions were legalized here.

"The time has come," Mr. Fox said on Thursday, drawing on President Obama's expressed support of same-sex marriage during his Inaugural Address on Monday.

But even Mr. Fox conceded that though Rhode Island is in many ways a deeply Democratic state, it is probably more socially conservative than its neighboring New England states, all of which have legalized same-sex marriage.

"It's a combination of the quirkiness of our little state, the really entrenched opposition of our Catholic Church," as well as the dominant role that the church has historically played in the state, Mr. Fox said.

Both advocates for and opponents of gay marriage vowed to use grass-roots support and direct lobbying to sway the state's senators.

"The importance of getting the bill out of the House early, and over to the Senate, is key to our strategic goals," said Ray Sullivan, the campaign director of Rhode Islanders United for Marriage, a coalition in support of the bill.

Opponents, meanwhile, were confident that the measure would not succeed.

"The Senate has always been a stalwart for protecting life, marriage and family in Rhode Island," said Christopher Plante, the executive director of the National Organization for Marriage Rhode Island, the driving force behind the opposition here.

"Rhode Island has bigger issues than gay marriage," Mr. Plante said. "Our economy remains stagnant at best, in the tank at worst. We're tied for the worst unemployment rate in the nation. There's going to be a lot of things on the agenda between now and whenever the Senate decides to take this up."