Gay marriage supporters rally Thursday in downtown Portland, Maine, in a final campaign push before Tuesday's vote on a same-sex marriage referendum.
NOM has given more than $5 million to defeat same-sex marriage in the four states and is depending on religious allies, including the Catholic and Mormon churches, to get out the message and the vote.
Black voters are another major coalition for NOM. The religious black community helped pass Proposition 8 in California, which amended California's constitution to ban same-sex marriage, and Brown says he's confident black voters will help defeat the ballot measure in Maryland.
"We have our own rainbow coalition," Brown says. "We have a pretty diverse coalition, and it is not just split between Republicans and Democrats."
While Brown dismisses current polling showing the ballot initiatives in Washington and Maine winning the majority of support, Brown admits those states are a bit more challenging to win.
"I think Maine is particularly difficult," Brown says. "We are just up against a tremendous money advantage on the other side."
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Brown says his group, which has successfully defended the heterosexual definition of marriage in 34 states, says legalizing gay marriage hurts communities. Brown argues kids in states with legalized gay marriage are taught about homosexuality in schools and religious organizations are ostracized.
In the realm of public opinion, same-sex marriage has seen increased support over the last 15 years. A Pew survey released in February shows 46 percent of Americans favor same-sex marriage, while 44 percent are opposed.
And while gay voters are only 4 percent of the national electorate, they are a powerful constituency shaping public opinion on the issue of marriage equality.
"They vote, they attend protests, they report being interested in politics, and they write letters to policy makers," says Patrick Egan, a political scientist at New York University who studies gay voters.
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Egan's research shows that the LBGT community is more politically active than voters at large, and they run the gamut on the political spectrum. Exit polls in 2008 reveal roughly 75 percent of gay voters cast ballots for Democratic candidates while 25 percent vote for Republicans.
Of course, marriage is not the only thing gay voters will fight for in the 2012 election. Like any constituency group, the LBGT community is multi-faceted.
"The biggest misconception is that gay voters only care about gay issues," Egan says. "While ballot initiatives like gay marriage influence some gay voters, they care about the same issues as all Americans including the economy, education and national security."
Lt. Dan Choi, a former American infantry officer in the Army who became a gay rights symbol when he chained himself to the White House fence during the debate over "don't ask, don't tell" agrees, but says marriage equality remains one of his top voting issues.
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"If you step into a voting booth you have to know that you are a full person first. And we are not there yet," Choi says. "In the mind of the gay voter, if you cannot go into that voting booth as a full person, your vote is going to be about creating equality."
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