November 08, 2007

Abstract: (Angus Reid Global Monitor) - Comparing to last year, a greater number of people in the United States agree with the notion of granting specific rights to homosexual couples, according to a poll by TNS released by the Washington Post and ABC News. 55 per cent of respondents think same-sex partners should be allowed to form legally recognized civil unions, up 10 points since June 2006.

(Angus Reid Global Monitor) - Comparing to last year, a greater number of people in the United States agree with the notion of granting specific rights to homosexual couples, according to a poll by TNS released by the Washington Post and ABC News. 55 per cent of respondents think same-sex partners should be allowed to form legally recognized civil unions, up 10 points since June 2006.

In 2004, marriage certificates were issued to same-sex couples by local governments in the states of California, Oregon, New Mexico and New York. In May 2004, the state of Massachusetts allowed gay and lesbian partners to apply for marriage licenses, the first state-sanctioned homosexual weddings in the U.S.

Civil union and domestic partnership laws in Vermont, Connecticut, California and New Jersey grant same-sex couples all state-level rights and obligations of marriage—in areas such as inheritance, income tax, insurance and hospital visitation. Other forms of domestic partnership exist in the District of Columbia, Hawaii and Maine. There are more than 1,000 federal-level rights of marriage that cannot be granted by states.

Same-sex marriage is currently legal in the Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, Canada and South Africa, and at least 18 countries offer some form of legal recognition to same-sex unions.

On Oct. 29, Illinois senator Barack Obama—who is seeking the Democratic Party’s presidential nomination—referred to where he stands on same-sex marriage, saying, "You want the word marriage and I believe that the issue of marriage has become so entangled—the word marriage has become so entangled with religion—that it makes more sense for me as president, with that authority, to talk about the civil rights that are conferred with civil unions. Individual denominations should make the decisions about what to recognize as a marriage."

Polling Data

Do you think homosexual couples should or should not be allowed to form legally recognized civil unions, giving them the legal rights of married couples in areas such as health insurance, inheritance and pension coverage?

	Nov. 2007	Jun. 2006	Mar. 2004
Should	55%	45%	51%
Should not	42%	48%	46%
No opinion	3%	7%	3%

Source: TNS / Washington Post / ABC News
Methodology: Telephone interviews with 1,131 American adults, conducted from Oct. 29 to Nov. 1, 2007. Margin of error is 3 per cent.