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May 14, 2012, 7:16 AM
Poll: Age and Partisanship Continue to Mark Divide Over Gay Marriage
By DALIA SUSSMAN
President Obama’s endorsement of same-sex marriage last week has had little effect on Americans’ views of the issue so far, the latest New York Times/CBS News poll finds.
The poll asked respondents a three-part question: whether same-sex couples should be allowed to legally marry, or if they should be allowed to form civil unions but not marry, or if there should be no legal recognition of a gay couple’s relationship. Nearly 4 in 10, 38 percent, said they should be allowed to marry, similar to recent surveys, but up significantly from just 2 in 10 who said so in 2004.
Another 24 percent said same-sex couples should be allowed to form civil unions.
But 1 in 3 said there should be no legal recognition at all of the relationships. In November 2004, 44 percent said same-sex relationships should not be legally recognized.
Age plays an important role, with younger Americans more apt to support same-sex marriage than older Americans. Political partisanship is a factor as well. A majority of Democrats and about 4 in 10 independents back same-sex marriage, while Republicans are far more likely to say there should be no legal recognition of the relationships, the poll found.
Last week, North Carolina’s voters joined 30 other states in backing laws that effectively ban same-sex marriage.
In the poll, 57 percent of respondents say the issue should be left to individual state governments to decide. Just a third say the federal government should determine its legality. Here, Republicans and independents are more closely aligned, with most in each group saying it should be up to each state. Democrats are divided on the question.
The nationwide poll is based on telephone interviews conducted May 11-13 on landlines and cellphones with 615 adults and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus four percentage points.
Additional results from this poll will be available Monday evening atNYTimes.com.

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John Marttila
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