Poll: Most Americans Support Roe vs. Wade

The Harris Poll has been taking the public's opinion on roe v. Wade ever since the Supreme Court handed down its ruing back in 1973. Over the course of time, the percentage of support has ranged from 40 to 65%.

The latest poll shows that support for the decision has been increasing at a significant rate in a short period of time. Right now the level of support is at 56%, the highest it has been since 1998. It is also up 7% since last year. They also found that just 20% of the adults in the U.S. are in favor of not letting a woman get an abortion under any circumstances.

They also found that by a margin of 60% to 24%, they do not think that the Supreme Count will overturn Roe v. Wade.

Some of the other results are:

There is 25% of the adult population who favor allowing abortions in all circumstances, 52% in some circumstance and 20% who do not favor abortion under any circumstance.

Breaking the results down by parties, most of the Democrats, 61%, support Roe v. Wade 51% of the Republicans oppose it, while 45% of the Republicans support it and 33% of the Democrats oppose it.

The number of Republicans who support the decision has increased Over the last year from 37% to 45% and the number of Democrats who oppose it has gone down from 43% to 33%.

They also looked that the opinions of the independent voters, who will be playing a big part in the 2008 election and they favor Roe v Wade by a margin of 61% to 36%, Last year it was 56% to 37%.

This might well explain why candidates like former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, even with his more liberal or moderate views on issues like this and gun control, are out in front in the Republican party, which usually espouses a much more conservative program. Right now the current administration is not getting a high rate of approval and this could be the Republican voters way of saying that they do not follow the President's way of thinking.

The way it looks right now, Giuliani's position is more in line with the opinion of the voters than the President's or the far right members of the party. Of course, this is right now an with about a year until the general election, anything can happen and probably will.

The poll was taken by phone between October 16 and 23, 2007. The participants were 1,052 U.S. adults nationwide.

Source: Harris Poll http://www.harrisinteractive.com/