Sarah Dowling, who lives outside
Portland, Maine, has been waiting for almost two decades to
marry her girlfriend. A sign of hope that voters will give her
that right hangs in her closet: a new wedding dress.

“It’s hard not to be optimistic,” said Dowling, 54, a
social worker. “I know so many people who have moved from a
not-supportive stance to a supportive one.”

In Maine, Maryland and Washington, voters on Nov. 6 will
decide whether to allow gay men and lesbians to wed. The issue
is drawing the broadest public support to date and surveys show
the measures leading in all three states — giving advocates
their best chance yet for the first ballot-box victory after a
decade of defeat.

About half of Americans say gay marriage should be legal,
according to national polls. A June 28-July 9 poll by the
Washington-based Pew Research Center found that 48 percent of
Americans favor same-sex marriage, with 44 percent opposed.
That’s a reversal from 2009, when they opposed it 54-37 percent.

“The increase in support for same-sex marriage has been
quite rapid over the past four years, a much steeper rise than
we saw over the previous eight years that we’d been tracking
this,” said Scott Keeter, the director of survey research for
Pew, a nonpartisan group, in an interview. “Most analysts of
public opinion expected this growth in support to happen,
although perhaps not as fast as it actually did.”

Earlier Rejection

Voters have rejected same-sex marriage in all 32 states
where it has appeared on the ballot, including in Maine in 2009.
The unions are legal in six states and the District of Columbia
because of court rulings and measures approved by public
officials.

“The most important thing we can do is take the talking
point away from opponents of marriage equality that we have
consistently lost at the ballot box,” said Fred Sainz, a
spokesman for the Human Rights Campaign in Washington, in an
interview.

Advocates on both sides say the state contests will be
close, and that opinions may shift over the next month as
political advertising becomes more frequent.

The Maine gay marriage measure was leading 53-43 percent,
according to a poll by the nonprofit Maine People’s Resource
Center. In Maryland, an OpinionWorks survey showed it leading
49-39 percent.

Washington State

In Washington, the gay marriage measure led 51-37 percent,
according to an Elway Research poll. That may not be as
promising as appears. H. Stuart Elway, the president of the
Seattle-based polling firm, said ballot measures have typically
needed more than 60 percent by late summer in order to win.

In a fourth state, Minnesota, voters are split over a
proposed constitutional amendment to bar homosexual marriage,
according to a Public Policy Polling survey last month. Marriage
is limited to heterosexual couples in the state, and the measure
would cement that stance.

Brian Brown, the president of the Washington-based National
Organization for Marriage, which is working to defeat the
measures, said polls have tended to overstate support.

“We have confidence that the people of all four states are
going to protect traditional marriage,” Brown said in an
interview. “The other side wants to make it seem inevitable.
It’s inevitable so you should just give up. Well, we’re not
giving up.”

TV Ads

Only supporters had run television advertisements in
Washington and Maine through Oct. 1, according to data from New
York-based Kantar Media’s CMAG, which tracks political spending.
No ads for either side had appeared in Maryland.

“We have the momentum, but I think it’s going to be a nail
biter,” said Kevin Nix, a spokesman for Marylanders for
Marriage Equality, a Baltimore-based group fighting for the
passage of gay marriage, in an interview. “In the past, we’ve
seen the opposition come fast and furious near the end, in terms
of their funding and their ad buys.”

Same-sex marriage is legal in Iowa, New York,
Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont, New Hampshire and the
District of Columbia. The unions aren’t recognized by the U.S.
government because of a 1996 law that’s being challenged in
federal appeals court.

In May, President Barack Obama became the first president
to endorse same-sex marriage, a stance later incorporated into
the Democratic Party’s platform.

Protecting Churches

The question was placed on the ballot directly by gay-
marriage advocates in Maine. In the other two states, the
measures seek to overturn laws passed by Washington Governor
Christine Gregoire and Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley, both
Democrats.

In all three states, religious leaders wouldn’t be forced
to marry gay couples, a step intended to head off opposition.

In Maryland, Delman Coates, a reverend who leads a more
than 7,000-member Baptist church in Clinton, is encouraging his
congregation to vote in favor.

“I don’t think it’s proper to ask, ‘What do you believe
theologically?’” he said in an interview. “The proper issue is
whether all people — even gays and lesbians — deserve to be
treated equally under the law.”

Maryland Shift

Steve Raabe, president of the Annapolis-based polling firm
OpinionWorks, said opinion has shifted significantly in Maryland
in favor of gay marriage since the measure first passed the
legislature earlier this year. He said that was driven by rising
support from black voters, which may have been helped by Obama’s
shift and an endorsement by the National Association for the
Advancement of Colored People, the Baltimore-based civil rights
group.

“It’s definitely moving in the direction of the
proponents,” he said in an interview. “The biggest factor is
what happens between now and November in the churches. They
could really move those numbers back.”

In Maine, Matt Hutson, a spokesman for Protect Marriage
Maine, which is working to defeat the measure, said public
opinion is beginning to shift his way. He said his own poll was
more favorable to his side than the other surveys, showing a
narrower gap.

Phone Banks

“The fact that the race is still so tight simply reflects
that Mainers have not changed their mind on this issue since
2009 when they rejected same-sex marriage,” he said in an e-
mail. “We do expect this to be a close vote, one in which
traditional marriage wins again.”

Dowling, the Maine resident who wants to get married, has
been volunteering for Mainers United for Marriage, which is
advocating for the law’s passage.

If the measure prevails, she’ll be able to marry Linda
Wolfe, 57, a nurse with whom she has a 11-year-old daughter,
Maya. Still, she has fallback plans for her wedding dress.

“I bought it, and I didn’t tell my partner, and when it
arrived she said, ’Well, what are we going to do if we lose?’”
she said. “We’re going to have a bonfire and invite our
friends.”

To contact the reporters on this story:
William Selway in Washington at
wselway@bloomberg.net;
Esmé E. Deprez in New York at
edeprez@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story:
Stephen Merelman at
smerelman@bloomberg.net