PRINCETON, N.J., Jan. 23 (UPI) -- Roe vs. Wade is synonymous with abortion rights but younger adults tend to express no opinion on the landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision, a survey indicates.
A USA Today/Gallup poll of 1,012 U.S. adults found 53 percent said they wanted the 40-year-old landmark abortion decision kept in place while 29 said they wanted it overturned and 18 percent had no opinion.
A majority has always opposed overturning the decision while roughly a third favor doing so, but in 2006, as the percentage of Americans with no opinion about the status of Roe vs. Wade increased, the percentage opposed to overturning it dropped to less than 60 percent and has remained in the lower range ever since, Gallup said.
This year, with a record 18 percent unsure, the percentage wanting it overturned fell to less than 30 percent for only the third time since 1989.
Gallup trends indicated the increase in public uncertainty about overturning Roe vs. Wade was largely the result of a growing percentage of young adults ages 18-29 expressing no opinion.
"This suggests that the generation born entirely after Roe became law has had less exposure to information about the decision than those who lived through the original decision, or were at least old enough to witness some of the major abortion debates during the 1980s and '90s," Gallup said.
The same poll, conducted Dec. 27-30, indicated 52 percent of Americans favored making abortion legal only under certain circumstances, 28 percent said it should always be legal and 18 percent said it should never be legal.
The poll's margin of error was 4 percentage points.
