Marijuana legalization has the support of 52% of Washington state voters, according to a poll released last week by The Washington Poll [12], a quarterly sounding of public opinion on different issues conducted by the University of Washington. Only 35% opposed it, with 13% either undecided or not responding to the question.
Pollsters asked 1,252 registered voters whether they would support "removing state civil and criminal penalties for possession or use of marijuana." That is the precise language used on I-1068 [13], the marijuana legalization initiative sponsored by Sensible Washington [14], which is now engaged in a signature-gathering campaign to get the measure on the November ballot.
A marijuana legalization initiative is already on the ballot in California, where it leads narrowly in recent polls, but has not cracked 50%. Another legalization initiative is in the signature gathering phase in Oregon [15]. It is unclear whether either the Washington or Oregon initiatives will manage to get onto the ballot in November, but these kinds of numbers can only help the Washington effort.
The Washington Poll did not provide crosstabs with more detailed breakdowns of who did and did not support marijuana legalization. It had a margin of error of 2.8%.