Gay-marriage advocates, coming off their first ballot-box victories, are targeting New Jersey and five other U.S. states where the road to legalization is simpler because voters can’t overturn laws through referendums.

In Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Minnesota, New Jersey and Rhode Island, lawmakers plan to consider or revisit the issue next year, and all except Minnesota already allow civil unions. Even though they prevailed in votes in four states Nov. 6 after a decade of defeats, backers say they prefer to make homosexual weddings legal through legislatures or courts. -- Bloomberg BusinessWeek