North Carolina voters overwhelmingly approved a constitutional amendment yesterday to ban same-sex marriage, declaring that marriage is defined as between one man and one woman.
Just to tie things up, respondents in the Elon University Poll six weeks ago indicated that they believed that gay couples should be accorded some type of legal recognition. The poll was of North Carolina residents and didn’t screen for likely voters. The margin of victory was even higher than predicted by polls of likely voters.
Yesterday, Gallup reported that 50% of Americans believe same-sex marriages should be recognized by law as valid, with the same rights as traditional marriages.
Will this result in North Carolina make things harder for President Obama to repeat his 2008 victory here? It’s early in the campaign and those who turn out in a general election are motivated by different things than those who vote in a primary. But it certainly appears as if Mitt Romney has another issue to campaign on when he visits N.C., particularly as the Obama Administration grapples with its position on gay rights.
— John Robinson
Seems to me the Elon University “poll” was a transparent attempt to keep pro-Amendment people from voting. Next time we will know to place the Elon University poll in the column with New York slimes, Washington Compost and NBC News. They obviously slant towards dems and are not a true representation of reality.
Matt, unlike many polls, the Elon University Poll was not intended to be used as a predictor of the primary. The Elon poll was taken from a base of North Carolina residents, not likely voters.
But what is the point of that if the results are useless? Clearly they were wrong. I am just glad this issue is behind us, as it has divided our state and pit people against each other for no reason.
61% is a lot but it probably would have been much higher if the amendment only banned gay marriage and didn’t mention civil unions (over 70%).