【商业周刊 20150426】美国人的思想变化太快了

满仓

【中文标题】美国人的思想变化太快了
【原文标题】This Is How Fast America Changes Its Mind
【登载媒体】商业周刊
【原文作者】Alex Tribou、Keith Collins
【原文链接】http://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2015-pace-of-social-change/



在马萨诸塞州首先允许同性婚姻之后的11年，最高法院将在4月28举办听证会，决定是否要让这项权利覆盖全国。很多州已经立法支持同性恋婚姻，2013年之后有28个州立法，目前一共有36个州允许同性恋婚姻。这种短时间里大范围普及的现象并非仅限于同性恋婚姻，美国的社会变化似乎遵循着一种模式：几个州先开创先例，之后是一个大事件——往往是法院判决或者草根的抗议运动——让更多的州效仿，最终改变联邦法律。

我们来看看下面6个问题：跨种族婚姻、禁酒令、女性选举权、堕胎、同性婚姻和偶发性使用大麻。在过去都发生了什么，以及在可预见的未来会怎样。















如果这种模式持续下去，大麻合法化运动获得广泛接受的时间，要比其它社会现象短得多。尽管我们看到社会改变基本上都遵循的同样的模式，但是现在的变化越来越快。最高法院废除最后一个州的跨种族通婚禁令花了将近200年的时间，禁酒令运动花费了70年时间通过了宪法第十八条修正案。如果最高法院认为同性婚姻的禁令违宪，那么所有50个州只花费了十年多一点的时间就从同性婚姻不合法变成合法。

从提出问题到联邦采取行动的时间就更短了。在加利福尼亚法院推翻跨种族婚姻禁令之后的19年，最高法院正式支持这一判决。现在，最高法院在决定性的判定发布仅仅两年之后，又开始重新审阅这个问题。

改变的速度

从提出问题到联邦采取行动的原因。




原文：

Eleven years after Massachusetts became the first state to allow same-sex couples to marry, the Supreme Court on April 28 will hear arguments about whether to extend that right nationwide. The case comes amid a wave of gay marriage legalization: 28 states since 2013, and 36 overall. Such widespread acceptance in a short amount of time isn't a phenomenon unique to gay marriage. Social change in the U.S. appears to follow a pattern: A few pioneer states get out front before the others, and then a key event—often a court decision or a grassroots campaign reaching maturity—triggers a rush of state activity that ultimately leads to a change in federal law.

We looked at six big issues—interracial marriage, prohibition, women’s suffrage, abortion, same-sex marriage, and recreational marijuana — to show how this has happened in the past, and may again in the very near future.

If the pattern holds, the marijuana legalization movement may take far less time than other issues to gain widespread acceptance. Though the pattern of social change may have remained largely the same over the years, change is happening faster now. It took almost 200 years before the Supreme Court disposed of the last state laws banning interracial marriage. The prohibition movement spanned seven decades before passage of the 18th Amendment. If the Supreme Court finds that same-sex marriage bans are unconstitutional, gay couples will have gone from not being able to marry in any state to being able to marry in all 50 in little more than a decade.

The time from the trigger point to federal action is even shorter. It took 19 years for the Supreme Court to follow a California court in striking down interracial marriage bans. The Supreme Court is now revisiting same-sex marriage only two years after its pivotal decision on the issue.

Speed of Change

Number of years from an issue’s trigger point to federal action (all abortion years shown)