The heated debate over gay marriage is strengthening public support for legalizing civil unions for same-sex couples, with a majority of Americans now in favor of such formal recognition, according to two polls released Wednesday.
Reflecting what appears to be a search for middle ground on the issue, both the Washington Post-ABC News poll and the USA Today/CNN/Gallup poll showed a significant shift in public opinion on civil unions in recent months.
The latter survey found 54 percent of respondents favor civil unions for gay and lesbian couples, with 42 percent opposing them. In a poll conducted in July by the same organizations, 57 percent opposed civil unions and 40 percent favored them.
The Washington Post-ABC News poll found that 51 percent of respondents favor allowing same-sex couples to enter into civil unions with the same basic legal rights as married couples, up 6 percentage points in less than a month.
Deep divisions remain on gay marriage
But both surveys also reflected deep divisions on same-sex marriage.
The Post-ABC News survey found that 59 percent of Americans oppose gay marriage – up 4 percentage points from February. But the same poll found that 53 percent took issue with President Bush’s call for a constitutional amendment outlawing the full legal recognition of same-sex couples.
