Most Americans believe in equality in marriage and in the voting booth
Langer Associates for ABC and Washington Post. American adults. June 26-30. ±3.5%.
Overall, do you approve or disapprove of the U.S. Supreme Court's decision providing legally married same-sex couples with the same federal benefits given to other married couples?
Approve: 56
Disapprove: 41
Overall, do you approve or disapprove of the U.S. Supreme Court's decision letting stand a lower court ruling that allows gay marriage in California?
Approve: 51
Disapprove: 45
Overall, do you approve or disapprove of the U.S. Supreme Court's decision striking down a key part of the federal law overseeing voting rights for minorities?
Approve: 33
Disapprove: 51
Obviously, this poll questions didn't really dive into the actual legal details of the cases. For example, the question about the Proposition 8 ruling focuses entirely on the immediate result of the decision, not the more arcane question of standing.
But the poll is still a useful reminder that on the values questions raised by the rulings, most Americans lean in a progressive direction. On marriage equality, only conservatives, Republicans, and older people were strongly opposed to the court's rulings. Southerners tilted slightly against the rulings, but were basically evenly divided. Everyone else was enthusiastic.
The thing that surprised me the most in the poll was that on the question of voting rights, southerners were actually more opposed to the court's decision (53 percent opposition) than the country as a whole (51 percent opposition).
Moreover, older people were more opposed to the ruling than younger people. 48 percent of people under 40 opposed the ruling, but 54 percent of 40-64 year olds and 52 percent of people older than 65 opposed it. Basically, people old enough to remember why we passed the Voting Rights Act in the first place are more likely to support it.
Non-whites were more strongly against the ruling than whites, but 48 percent of whites still opposed it, compared with 35 percent who supported it. Only Republicans gave it more support than opposition, and even then it was basically a split—43 percent support and 42 percent opposition. Even conservatives opposed the ruling by a 10-point margin.
The polls can't change the court's decision, but numbers like this should encourage Democrats to push aggressively for legislation both to remedy the court's ruling and also to guarantee a minimum set standards of voting rights on a national basis. With Republicans in the House, it's obvious that Democrats won't get everything they ask for, but that shouldn't stop them from asking. Let the Republicans be the ones to say no—with strong public support for voting rights, there's no reason for Democrats to negotiate against themselves.