Hartford (AP) - A bill that would abolish the state's death penalty for all future cases and replace the punishment with life imprisonment has passed its first round of votes in the General Assembly despite a recent poll's findings that repeal is unpopular with a majority of voters.

Members of the General Assembly's Judiciary Committee voted 24-19 in favor of the bill on Wednesday. Now, the vote awaits further legislative action by the state's Senate.

The vote on the bill came shortly after a new Quinnipiac University poll showed 62 percent of Connecticut residents do not support repealing the death penalty. The poll, released Wednesday, surveyed 1,622 registered voters on an array of issues. The margin of sampling error for the poll was 2.4 percentage points.

Despite the findings of the poll, state lawmakers on both sides of the issue have raised concerns on what the poll is actually reflecting.

Mike Lawlor, the undersecretary of Criminal Justice Policy for the Office of Policy and Management, said despite the lack of public support shown in the poll Gov. Dannel P. Malloy would sign legislation on the issue.

"If we had polled civil rights in 1962, we would still be operating largely under Jim Crow laws," Malloy said. "So I think I'll stick with my position, and that is, that matters of conscience, people should be driven by their own conscience."

The Quinnipiac University poll director, Doug Schwartz, said the poll found "about 2 to 1 were against abolishing the death penalty."

Of those surveyed, more than 80 percent of Republicans said they believe abolishing the death penalty is a "bad idea," compared to 44 percent of Democrats.

According to the poll, Connecticut men are more likely to oppose death penalty repeal than women.

Additionally, more than half of state residents polled said they think death row inmates should still be executed if the penalty is abolished.

While repealing the state's death penalty remains unpopular among voters, the percentage of Connecticut residents who said they oppose abolishing the punishment has dropped 5 percent since last year.

Rep. Gary Holder-Winfield, D-New Haven, who is an outspoken supporter of repealing the death penalty, said the poll's recent findings on the death penalty are misleading. Holder-Winfield, the committee's vice chair, criticized the poll for not asking residents if they support life imprisonment in place of capital punishment, as it has in previous years.

In March 2011, Quinnipiac released a poll that surveyed nearly 1,700 state voters on issues including the death penalty.

The poll asked multiple questions on the subject and found that just under half the residents surveyed said they preferred a sentence of life in prison without parole over the death penalty.

"It's cool if you want to obfuscate and talk about something we're not talking about, except that on something this serious, you should talk about the issue before the state," he said.

Similar to Holder-Winfield, death penalty opponent Sen. John Kissel, R-Enfield, said the poll is not reflective of the population that would support repeal with certain caveats, like life imprisonment without parole or solitary confinement.

Kissel, an opponent of the bill, said the poll does point out that most state voters do not want death penalty repeal.