Back on Election Night, when Mississippi voters defeated the Personhood Amendment, Rachel asked me why I had expected the opposite result. Meet the latest Public Policy Polling results:
Mississippi remains one of the most conservative states in the country when it comes to gay marriage: only 13% of voters think it should be legal to 78% who believe it should remain illegal. Even among Democrats there's only 19% support for it. Most states we poll now at least have a majority in support of civil unions but that's not the case in Mississippi- 60% of voters are completely opposed to any sort of legal recognition for gay couples with just 38% supporting either gay marriage or civil unions.
That only 78 percent of my home state is now opposed to same-sex marriage is a real change, I guess. In 2004, 86 percent of voters backed a constitutional amendment banning it. Every county went for it then -- that's the map on the left. On the right, you can see that the Personhood Amendment lost most counties, evidence that you can ban teh gay but you'd better not mess with birth control in Mississippi.
Another interesting return, from a question I kinda resent: Only 10 percent of the state backs secession. Opposition to leaving the union increases as you move up the age brackets, topping out at 74 percent in the over-65 crowd. I'm calling it evidence that people like their Medicaid and Social Security, both from Uncle Sam. The lowest level of opposition, at 50 percent, is among people who identify as "very liberal." Maybe they want to secede from Mississippi?
Full PPP returns here (pdf).