A few months ago we argued that the answer was “no” to a book entitled, “Is Marriage for White People?” Well, a new study is saying that many agree when referring to interracial couples.

According to a new Gallup poll, 96 percent of Blacks and 84 percent of whites approve of Black-white marriages. When Gallup first questioned Black and white marriages in 1958, only four percent of Americans overall approved and it wasn’t until 1997 that approval exceeded the majority level.

Could we be making progress in the way that we view interracial couples? Perhaps. “Approval of Black-white marriage is well above the majority level among all key subgroups, though slightly lower among Southerners, Republicans, conservatives and those with no college education. Senior citizens are the least approving of Black-white marriage among major subgroups, at 66%,” the report reads.

Dating back to when Gallup first started gathering information on the subject, Blacks have always been more approving than whites of interracial marriage. However, the approval gap has been narrowing steadily since 1968.  

The organization states that more racial tolerance and a belief in the “progress and equality” for Blacks in the U.S. could be reasons for the increase in acceptance.

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(Photo: OLIVER BERG/dpa /Landov)