I don't think capital punishment and creationism follow the same trend as women's suffrage, interracial marriage, etc. The issues in the article started with lo

I don't think capital punishment and creationism follow the same trend as women's suffrage, interracial marriage, etc. The issues in the article started with low state-level support and rapidly gained acceptance across the country; at some threshold the Supreme Court stepped in and said "this is now accepted as law nation-wide. I don't have the numbers to back this up, but I don't think creation teaching and capital punishment started at a low level of support and rapidly ramped up across many states. State-level legislation on creation-teaching is limited to a few conservative areas. Capital punishment has been around forever and support for it has fluctuated with the times. I agree that abortion doesn't really fit the pattern of the other issues in the article, though. Supreme court approval seems to have come prematurely in that case.