Kathryn Lopez in NRO's The Corner:

Pollster John McLaughlin, who is based in his native New York, raises the question: “If they had brought the gay marriage bill to a public referendum, I don’t think it would have passed.”

He continues:

No state has ever passed it via referendum. Even California saw Proposition 8 fail. The fact that Governor Cuomo pushed it through without a referendum, which would have taken two consecutive years for the legislature to authorize, just shows that he and his allies were concerned that it wouldn’t pass — especially if it faced a two-year public debate.

Gay marriage often over-polls its approval levels. People sense the media is pro-gay-marriage and either say they are for it or undecided, when they are not. Prop 8 failed due to majority African American, Latino, and Asian American opposition. A New York referendum would have been very important. Now we’ll never know.