The day after North Carolina approved a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage, President Obama has made his official position on the matter clear: He supports marriage equality.
On Wednesday, Obama told ABC News: "It is important for me to go ahead and affirm that I think same-sex couples should be able to get married."
Obama is the first sitting president to back gay marriage. His views have changed over time -- he has previously said he believes that marriage is between a man and a woman, though he supported civil unions for gay and lesbian couples -- but his recent announcement will not likely have an immediate effect on public policy.
In his ABC interview, Obama said, "You know, Malia and Sasha, they have friends whose parents are same-sex couples. There have been times where Michelle and I have been sitting around the dinner table and we’re talking about their friends and their parents and Malia and Sasha, it wouldn’t dawn on them that somehow their friends’ parents would be treated differently. It doesn’t make sense to them and frankly, that’s the kind of thing that prompts a change in perspective."
To celebrate the news, we're sharing 11 fascinating new findings from a recent survey by HuffPost blogger and same-sex wedding expert Bernadette Coveney Smith, who polled 500 engaged or newly-married same-sex couples in 2010 and 2011.
