Many US Democrats are blaming the defeat of Senator John Kerry in Tuesday's presidential election on a backlash against gay marriage, and especially the highly publicised gay weddings conducted by San Francisco city hall earlier this year.
Democratic Senator Diane Feinstein of California said she believed the action of San Francisco Mayor, Gavin Newsom, in permitting the marriages energised a very conservative vote that helped swing the election for President Bush.
"I think it gave them a position to rally around," she told a press conference in San Francisco. "I think the whole issue has been too much, too fast, too soon, and people aren't ready for it."
The openly gay Democratic Congress member, Barney Frank of Massachusetts, also criticised what he called the "spectacle weddings" in the California city.
Mr Frank said the television pictures galvanised conservatives in 11 states, including Ohio, where constitutional amendments against gay marriage were on the ballot.
The California Supreme Court later declared the 4,000 gay marriages in San Francisco invalid but the image of the traditional social order breaking down under Democratic leadership resonated with voters.
Mr Newsom stood by his decision, telling The New York Times: "If you think something is right you have a moral obligation to act."
Ms Kate Kendall, director of the National Centre for Lesbian Rights, said: "Shame on Senator Feinstein for latching on to the most facile and shallow explanations for the result," adding that she would not accept that a leader who stood for equality and had the courage of his convictions was doing the wrong thing.
All 11 states with gay rights ballot initiatives voted to ban gay marriages, and eight states including Ohio went further and curtailed rights under civil unions and domestic partnerships involving unmarried heterosexual couples.
The measures were encouraged by Bush political adviser Karl Rove as part of his strategy to get conservatives to come out and vote, though two of the 11 states, Oregon and Michigan, went to Mr Kerry.
However, 60 per cent of voters said they supported legal recognition of same-sex couples and Mr Bush himself said in a debate with Mr Kerry he did not oppose civil unions, though he supported a constitutional ban on gay marriage.
Both Mr Kerry and his running mate, John Edwards, made a point of mentioning in debates that Vice-President Dick Cheney's daughter, Mary, his chief campaign aide, lives openly with her gay partner.
By campaigning on moral values Mr Bush increased support from religious groups, including Roman Catholics. Fifty-two per cent of Catholics voted for Mr Bush in the election and 47 per cent for Mr Kerry, the first Catholic to seek the White House since president John F. Kennedy.
Among evangelical or born-again Christians, 78 per cent voted for the President and 21 per cent for the Democrat.
As counting wound up in the election yesterday, Mr Bush won Iowa by a margin of 13,000 votes, the first Republican to take the mid-western state since Ronald Reagan in 1984.