Death row prisoners will continue to be executed in Virginia.

In a blow to death penalty foes, the General Assembly on Wednesday approved Gov. Terry McAuliffe’s proposal to allow the state to secretly purchase lethal drugs for executions from small drug manufacturers that would remain unidentified.

Following in the footsteps of other states, Gov. McAuliffe presented that plan in a bid to halt a Republican-backed effort to revive use of the electric chair if the state was unable to purchase the lethal drugs that are in short supply.

The Republican-dominated House of Delegates initially rejected the governor’s plan 51-47, then reconsidered and passed it by a 59-40 vote. The plan then passed the majority Republican Senate 21-16, largely on a party line vote.

The Democratic governor had said that if his proposal did not pass, he would veto House Bill 815 that would bring back the electric chair, essentially halting capital punishment in Virginia.

This was the closest that death penalty foes had come to abolishing executions in the commonwealth.

A coalition of religious leaders, open government advocates and foes of the death penalty had pressed legislators to reject the governor’s plan.

“When you have to resort to secrecy or brutality to keep the machinery of death going, it’s a sure sign that what we’re doing is not right,” Bishop Carroll Baltimore, former president of the Progressive National Baptist Convention, said at a news conference Monday, two days before the legislature returned to Richmond to deal with Gov. McAuliffe’s vetoes and amendments.

During the session, the legislature was unable to muster the votes to override any of the governor’s 32 vetoes, which killed corporate welfare for coal companies, pro-gun legislation and legislation that would have barred localities from removing flags, statues and other symbols of the slavery-promoting Confederacy.

The death penalty item is among the most controversial of the amendments to 54 pieces of legislation that the governor submitted and that the General Assembly considered.

Like other states, Virginia has been facing a shortage of the drugs used for executions, as companies that manufacture them seek to ward off potential consumer boycotts and other negative publicity.

Under the McAuliffe plan, a version of which was rejected in 2015, the state would turn to specialty pharmacies to compound the needed lethal drugs, with the names of the companies to be classified. Florida, Ohio and Texas already have passed similar legislation.

Currently, seven people are awaiting execution on Virginia’s death row. Since 1976, when the Supreme Court reinstated capital punishment, the Old Dominion has executed 111 people, the third most for any state.

While death sentences are now far less common and rarely, if ever imposed in most cities and counties in Virginia, it is still available for use.

The governor also succeeded in a deal with the General Assembly that will allow the state to borrow $2.1 billion to undertake a wave of construction at universities and other state facilities. The agreement will clear the way for spending $300 million to overhaul Capitol Square, including replacing the aging General Assembly Building and renovating Old City Hall. The governor and the legislature also found common ground on a new initiative called Go Virginia that will push development projects.

Among the final vetoes the governor issued and that were upheld are ones that:

• Rejected an effort to turn elections for mayor, city councils and schools into partisan affairs. The legislation would have required candidates to declare a political party identification for the first time since 1870.

• Halted legislation that would have allowed victims of domestic violence from carrying concealed guns without applying for a permit or taking required gun safety training.

• Blocked a bill that would have allowed people to brandish weapons in public and avoid prosecution unless it could be proven they sought to create fear.

• Wiped out a bill that would have benefited companies like McDonald’s that sell franchises. The legislation would have barred franchise owners and their employees from being considered employees of the franchising company.

The governor wrote that the franchise legislation would have relieved dominant franchisors of the obligations and responsibilities of an employer, meaning the person owning the franchise would have “to shoulder the burdens.”