Support for interracial marriage is now almost universal across America.
Gallup (“Record-High 86% Approve of Black-White Marriages“):
Americans are approaching unanimity in their views of marriages between blacks and whites, with 86% now approving of such unions. Americans’ views on interracial marriage have undergone a major transformation in the past five decades. When Gallup first asked about black-white marriages in 1958, 4% approved. More Americans disapproved than approved until 1983, and approval did not exceed the majority level until 1997.
This is almost certainly the biggest attitudinal change on a major social issue in my lifetime. Interpolating roughly from the trendlines, there was something like 14 percent approval in 1965; it’s now 14 percent disapproval. I graduated high school and college–indeed finished my PhD–with approval below 50 percent.
My guess upon seeing the headline was that blacks were holding down the opposition almost equally with whites. That’s not the case at all:
Approval of black-white marriages is at a record high among blacks and whites. Blacks have always been more approving than whites of interracial marriage, going back to 1968 when Gallup first was able to report reliable estimates on each group’s opinions. However, the gap in approval ratings has narrowed considerably, averaging 13 percentage points since 1997 but 32 points from 1968-1994.
Not surprisingly, approval is lowest in the South, among the elderly, those with a high school education or less, conservatives, and Republicans. But all those groups except the over-65s are tracking only four years behind the nation as a whole; the elderly are stuck in 1993:
Truly remarkable.
