According to Nate Silver over at FiveThirtyEight, a model can be built to predict when each state will legalize gay marriage – in the end, they all do. His model is based on three distinct variables:
1. The year in which the amendment was first voted upon;
2. The percentage of adults in 2008 Gallup tracking surveys who said that religion was an important part of their daily lives;
3. The percentage of white evangelicals in the state.
Silver states:
These variables collectively account for about three-quarters of the variance in the performance of marriage bans in different states. The model predicts, for example, that a marriage ban in California in 2008 would have passed with 52.1 percent of the vote, almost exactly the fraction actually received by Proposition 8. Unsurprisingly, there is a very strong correspondence between the religiosity of a state and its propensity to ban gay marriage, with a particular “bonus” effect depending on the number of white evangelicals in the state. Marriage bans, however, are losing ground at a rate of slightly less than 2 points per year. So, for example, we’d project that a state in which a marriage ban passed with 60 percent of the vote year would only have 58 percent of its voters approve the ban year.
According to this model, each state will eventually grant marriage to same-sex couples. When will your state change?
The model predicts further, that by 2012, about half of the nation’s states would vote against a marriage ban, effectively granting same-sex couples marriage rights in at least 25 of the 50 states.
Text breakdown of the States:
2009 (now)
- Vermont
- New Hampshire
- Massachusetts
- Maine
- Rhode Island
- Connecticut
- Nevada
- Washington
- Alaska
- New York
- Oregon
2010
- California
- Hawaii
- Montana
- New Jersey
- Colorado
2011
- Wyoming
- Delaware
- Idaho
- Arizona
2012
- Wisconsin
- Pennsylvania
- Maryland
- Illinois
2013
- Michigan
- Minnesota
- Iowa
- Ohio
- Utah
- Florida
2014
- New Mexico
- North Dakota
- Nebraska
- South Dakota
2015
- Indiana
- Virginia
- West Virginia
- Kansas
2016
- Missouri
2018
- Texas
2019
- North Carolina
- Louisiana
- Georgia
2020
- Kentucky
2021
- South Carolina
- Oklahoma
2022
- Tennessee
- Arkansas
2023
- Alabama
2024
- Mississippi
This is the first prediction for all states I have seen; though the study has Iowa wrong, it will be interesting to see when all fifty come in! My estimate has always been within 15 years and this shows 12-15. Equal rights are always slow, but once begun, progress can become exponential. I am pleased for my gay friends and the whole gay community that things are improving! (I am stunned that my home state of IA legalized Gay marriage before my home of 25 years, CA!!!)
HCS, Burbank, CA