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Public Opinion Quarterly 2005 69(4):599-616; doi:10.1093/poq/nfi052
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© The Author 2005. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the American Association for Public Opinion Research. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org.

Trends

Same-Sex Marriage and Civil Unions

Paul R. Brewer and Clyde Wilcox

PAUL R. BREWER is an associate professor in the Department of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee. CLYDE WILCOX is a professor in the Department of Government at Georgetown University.

Address correspondence to Paul R. Brewer; e-mail: prbrewer@uwm.edu.

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

For many Americans, the issue of same-sex marriage burst upon the political scene in the fall of 2003, when the highest court in Massachusetts ruled that the state had no grounds to deny gay and lesbian couples the right to marry. Within a few months same-sex marriages were performed in a number of cities and counties, including large numbers of weddings in San Francisco, to widespread media attention. Religious conservatives pushed for a federal constitutional amendment that would ban same-sex marriage, which eventually won the backing of the president. Interest groups mobilized to "defend the equal rights" of same-sex couples to marry and to "defend the traditional family" by banning these marriages (see, e.g., Gordon, Tadlock, and Popp 2004Go). Our purpose is to describe trends in public opinion about same-sex marriage, including public support for legal recognition for same-sex marriage, civil unions that would give same-sex couples some of . . . [Full Text of this Article]


   Same-Sex Marriage, Religious Beliefs, and the Traditional Family
 

   Same-Sex Marriage and the Public Agenda
 

   Public Support for Same-Sex Marriage and Civil Unions
 

   Rights and Benefits for Gay Spouses
 

   Public Opinion about a Constitutional Amendment
 

   Same-Sex Marriage as a Campaign Issue
 

   Appendix
 
SAME-SEX MARRIAGE, RELIGIOUS BELIEFS, AND THE TRADITIONAL FAMILY
SAME-SEX MARRIAGE AND THE PUBLIC AGENDA
MARRIAGE
CIVIL UNIONS
MARRIAGE, CIVIL UNIONS, OR NEITHER
RIGHTS AND BENEFITS FOR GAY SPOUSES
CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT
SAME-SEX MARRIAGE AS A CAMPAIGN ISSUE


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