BOSTON — Senate Democrats on Thursday doubled down on their confidence in the constitutionality of legislation to protect immigrants in Massachusetts from federal civil enforcement actions and to clarify the limits of state cooperation with federal authorities.

The Ways and Means Committee bill (S 3072) the Senate plans to pass Thursday would prohibit civil arrests, including federal civil immigration arrests, from state courts, child care facilities, public schools, houses of worship, and health care providers without judicial warrants.

It also ensures state and local law enforcement officers generally cannot inquire about immigration status, share nonpublic personal information with federal immigration authorities without documented written authorization, or enter into new cooperation agreements with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

“It sounds simple, but we know it’s not. We are taking this action to protect our immigrant population, our immigrant families in our entire state, people who are part of our communities … people who we know are living in fear because of Donald Trump’s weaponizing of federal immigration authorities. We have all seen the pictures. We have all seen the videos. We have all heard the fear,” Senate President Karen Spilka said at a press conference with at least 20 other Democratic senators ahead of Thursday’s session.

Once the bill came up on the Senate floor, Minority Leader Bruce Tarr of Gloucester offered an order to have the Senate formally ask the Supreme Judicial Court to weigh in as to the constitutionality of three provisions of the Senate bill: whether the state-level cause of action against federal officers in the bill violates the Supremacy Clause, whether the bill’s restrictions on civil immigration enforcement violate the same clause, and whether any part of the bill would run into problems in light of a 2012 U.S. Supreme Court decision.

He said the Senate used “one of the most important tools that we have as a body,” the ability to seek the SJC’s advice and counsel on constitutional questions, recently when it asked the high court to weigh in on two then-pending ballot questions. He said senators should do the same for an issue like state restrictions around a federal responsibility like immigration enforcement.

“It seeks to maintain the integrity of the legislative process in this body and in this building, and it seeks to ensure that we respect the constitutional obligations that we are all sworn to uphold. And, in this case, the manifestation, among other things, of those obligations are that there are areas in which — while laudable in their intent, perhaps even noble in their purpose — there are areas in which we are proscribed from acting, lest what we do violate the Constitution,” Tarr said.

Sen. Cindy Friedman, the Senate Committee on Steering and Policy chair, said the committee “took careful steps to craft this policy, and we believe that we are both in an area that is legal and that is defensible.” She urged senators not to suspend the rules.

“We feel as confident as we can. Now, this is a litigious world. Is somebody one day going to sue us? I don’t know. But we feel we are in very, very, very good grounds here on the legality of that,” she said.

Tarr responded by saying the Senate would “proceed at great peril if we do not take the time to consult with the highest judicial authority.”

“It baffles me why we would not take advantage of that, why we would choose to dwell in the ignorance that’s created of not having the answers of the court, even if … they are confident that the act that now pends before us is constitutional,” he said.

Tarr got enough support to get a roll call vote on suspending the rules to allow the Senate to take his order up right away. But only his fellow Republicans supported it, and the Senate voted 5-35 not to suspend the rules. Instead, Tarr’s order (S 3083) was referred to the Committee on Rules.

Senators filed 76 amendments to the Ways and Means Committee draft. As of 2 p.m., the Senate had not taken up any amendments, though about 20 had been withdrawn.

Colin Young is the deputy editor for State House News Service and State Affairs Pro Massachusetts. Reach him at colin.young@statehousenews.com.