Candidate Comparison: Gay Marriage

This is the third in a series of posts about where the six front running presidential candidates stand on the issues. The information is from the Pew Forum. Previous posts were on abortion and the Iraq War.

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Hillary Clinton
Clinton opposes same-sex marriage and favors civil unions but said she would not stand in the way if New York passed a law legalizing same-sex marriage. In the U.S. Senate, she opposed amending the Constitution to ban gay marriage. While she has solicited and received the support of gay and lesbian groups, many gay activists were alarmed over her March 2007 comment that the morality of homosexuality was up "to others to conclude." She later released a statement saying that she does not believe homosexuality is immoral.

John Edwards
During his 2004 bid for the presidency, Edwards said that he personally opposed gay marriage, but supported civil unions for homosexual couples and said each state should determine its own policy. In 2006, Edwards called gay marriage "the single hardest social issue for me personally," saying that while he supports civil unions and partnership benefits, "it's a jump for me to get to gay marriage."

Rudolph Giuliani
Giuliani opposes gay marriage and has stated that "marriage should be between a man and a woman." He does not, however, support a federal amendment banning gay marriage. As mayor, he signed legislation recognizing domestic partnerships, marched in gay pride parades, actively supported gay rights and temporarily lived with a gay couple during his divorce.

John McCain
McCain says marriage should be between a man and a woman and that states should regulate marriage law. He opposed a federal constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage, but endorsed an Arizona ballot initiative to limit marriage to a man and a woman. He also supported the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act, which banned federal recognition of gay marriage and domestic partnerships.

Barack Obama
Obama says that he believes "marriage is between a man and a woman" but he wrote in The Audacity of Hope that he remains "open to the possibility that my unwillingness to support gay marriage is misguided ... I may have been infected with society's prejudices and predilections and attributed them to God." He supports granting civil unions for gay couples and opposed a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage. In March 2007, Obama initially dodged questions about the morality of homosexuality. He later went on to say on national television that he did not believe homosexuals are immoral.

W. Mitt Romney
As Massachusetts governor, Romney actively opposed a decision by the state's Supreme Judicial Court to permit same-sex marriages. He is an outspoken advocate of a federal constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage. He says that marriage should be "between a man and a woman" and "all children deserve a mother and a father." Earlier in his political career, Romney supported civil unions and said states should be allowed to decide whether to allow same-sex marriage.

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It appears that most of these (maybe not McCain?) support (or have once supported) gay civil unions, oppose a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage but don't endorse gay marriage. I'm not sure I see a big candidate difference on this one.