<http://people-press.org/reports/display.php3?ReportID=283>
Pragmatic Americans Liberal and Conservative on Social Issues Most Want Middle Ground on Abortion
Released: August 3, 2006
Summary of Findings
Americans cannot be easily characterized as conservative or liberal on today's most pressing social questions. The public's point of view varies from issue to issue. They are conservative in opposing gay marriage and gay adoption, liberal in favoring embryonic stem cell research and a little of both on abortion. Along with favoring no clear ideological approach to most social issues, the public expresses a desire for a middle ground on the most divisive social concern of the day: abortion.
Together, the results of the latest national survey by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press and Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life suggest that the public remains reluctant to move too far from current policies and practices on many key social policy questions. Despite talk of "culture wars" and the high visibility of activist groups on both sides of the cultural divide, there has been no polarization of the public into liberal and conservative camps.
Indeed, public opinion has moved little on these issues in recent years and continues to be mixed and often inconsistent, reflecting a blend of pragmatism and principle. For instance, a clear majority (56%) continues to oppose allowing gays and lesbians to marry while 35% express support. But nearly as large a majority (54%) supports allowing homosexual couples to enter into legal agreements that would give them many of the same rights as married couples.
The survey, conducted July 6-19 among 2,003 adults, also found that 55% prefer that abortion laws be decided at the national level rather than each state deciding for itself. This desire for a national policy prescription extends to other social issues as well. Despite growing antipathy toward Congress and low levels of trust in the federal government generally, majorities or pluralities also favor a national rather than state-by-state approach to policymaking on stem cell research, gay marriage and whether creationism should be taught in the schools along with evolution.
The poll also found no consensus among either supporters or opponents of gay marriage over how far to go to press their respective positions. Barely half of all those who favor allowing gays to marry say supporters should "push hard" to make it legal as soon as possible, while slightly more than four-in-ten urge caution so as to avoid creating "bad feelings against homosexuals." Similarly, only a small majority (54%) of gay marriage opponents favor amending the U.S. Constitution to ban gay marriage. The public is similarly divided on other hot-button issues. A slim majority (52%) opposes allowing gays and lesbians to adopt children.
Abortion continues to split the country nearly down the middle. But there is consensus in one key area: two out of three Americans (66%) support finding "a middle ground" when it comes to abortion. Only three-in-ten (29%), by contrast, believe "there's no room for compromise when it comes to abortion laws." This desire to find common ground extends broadly across the political and ideological spectrum.
Majorities of Republicans (62%), Democrats (70%) and political independents (66%) favor a compromise. So do majorities of liberals, moderates and conservatives. More than six-in-ten white evangelicals also support compromise, as do 62% of white, non-Hispanic Catholics.
Only one group expressed unwillingness to find a middle way. Two- thirds (66%) of those who support an outright ban on abortion say there should be no compromise. In contrast, two-thirds of those who want abortion to be generally available are ready to seek an accommodation.
An even larger consensus emerged on another issue. By more than 4-1, the public says pharmacists who personally oppose birth control for religious reasons should still be required to sell birth control pills to women. But while the public is overwhelmingly opposed to allowing pharmacists to refuse to sell birth control, there is less consensus on other issues having to do with pharmaceuticals and reproductive rights.
For instance, Americans split 48% to 41% over whether to allow women to obtain the so-called morning-after pill without first obtaining a doctor's prescription. The pill contains high doses of hormones which, when taken shortly after unprotected intercourse, can prevent ovulation or the implantation of a fertilized egg.
On another contentious issue related to reproduction, a majority of the public (56%) continues to believe that it is more important to conduct stem cell research that may lead to new medical cures rather than to avoid destroying the potential life of human embryos involved in the research (32%). For the first time in Pew polling, more white evangelicals now favor stem cell research (44%) than oppose it (40%).
Taken together, the findings on stem cells, abortion, conscience clauses for pharmacists and the morning-after pill underscore the public's deep ambivalence on reproductive rights.
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