Proponents of measures to prohibit same-sex marriage say New Jersey's Supreme Court ruling that committed same-sex couples deserve the same rights as heterosexual couples will motivate voters to pass constitutional bans.
But most of the measures on the Nov. 7 ballot in eight other states already have strong voter support. In fact, they may be even farther ahead than they appear, because polling on the issue has been consistently and inexplicably inaccurate.
Same-sex marriage ban supporters and opponents agree that pre-election polls often undercount support for the measures.
Voters in 15 states have approved such bans since August 2004, and polls conducted before elections in seven of them underestimated the yes vote. (No polls were published in three of the states, and poll results in the other five were within the margin of error.)
Polls that underestimated support for the bans were off by as much as 19 percentage points in North Dakota and 7 to 16 percentage points in six other states.
"What it means is that if history is any guide, which I think it is, you have to subtract at least four percentage points from pre-election polls to get a more accurate reading of what the results are going to be on election day," said Matt Foreman, executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, a gay rights group working in opposition to the amendments.
Bans are expected to pass Nov. 7 in Idaho, Virginia, South Carolina, South Dakota and Tennessee. The races still appear close in Colorado, Arizona and Wisconsin.
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