The 2010 census will include figures on the number of married gay couples in the United States.
Census officials said they plan to reverse a Bush administration policy that would have left same-sex couples off the upcoming census.
Gay couples could not get married anywhere in the United States during the last decennial count. But after two states sanctioned gay unions, the census bureau during the Bush administration said the marriages would not be counted. It claimed the federal Defense of Marriage Act prevented the federal government from recognizing same-sex marriages.
But the Obama administration says its interpretation of the act, known as DOMA, does not prohibit gathering the information. Gay marriage is now legal in six states although the first weddings yet to begin in three of them.
