Posted on May 17, 2004 | by Michael Foust

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (BP)--The same day that Massachusetts became the first state to legalize same-sex “marriage,” a new poll was released showing that two-thirds of Americans support the Federal Marriage Amendment that is now before the United States Senate.

The poll, conducted by Wirthlin Worldwide for the Alliance for Marriage, found that 57 percent of Americans strongly favor and 10 percent somewhat favor the wording of an amendment that would protect the traditional definition of marriage, thus banning same-sex “marriage.” Combined, 67 percent of Americans support the amendment while 30 percent oppose (23 percent strongly oppose, 7 percent somewhat oppose).

“The constitutional problem created by almost a decade of activist lawsuits to destroy our marriage laws demands a constitutional fix,” Matt Daniels, president of the Alliance for Marriage, said in a statement. “AFM’s marriage amendment has been introduced with bipartisan sponsorship in two successive sessions of Congress in order to protect the common sense view of marriage shared by the vast majority of Americans of every race, color and creed.”

The poll of 1,000 adults was conducted April 2-5. Among the poll’s other findings:

-- 79 percent of Republicans, 63 percent of independents and 56 percent of Democrats support the amendment.

-- 66 percent of men and 66 percent of women favor the amendment.

-- 67 percent of whites, blacks and Hispanics support the amendment.

The poll question asked:

“There has been some discussion, recently, about how marriage should be defined in the U.S. I am going to read you the wording of a possible amendment to the U.S. Constitution and then ask you whether you would favor or oppose such an amendment. The amendment says, ‘Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman. Neither this Constitution, nor the constitution of any State, shall be construed to require that marriage or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon any union other than the union of a man and a woman.’”

The amendments before the House and Senate differ slightly.
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For more information about the national debate over same-sex "marriage," visit
http://www.bpnews.net/samesexmarriage