The Nature of Seyfert 2 Galaxies with Obscured Broad-Line Regions. II. Individual Objects

We discuss the observational results (Paper I) of a spectropolarimetric and imaging study of 10 Seyfert 2 galaxies which show permitted broad emission lines in their polarized flux spectra. We find that the corrected continuum polarizations display, in all galaxies but NGC 1068, a rise in the amount of polarization in the broad wings of Hβ and Hα, while the polarization position angle remains unchanged between the broad-line wings and adjacent continuum. In a majority of the objects, the polarization electric vectors are essentially perpendicular to the radio structure axis and/or the position angle of the extended ionization cones or jets. A variety of evidence suggests that electron scattering is the dominant mechanism responsible for the nuclear polarizations in almost all the galaxies in the sample, although an additional contribution from dust scattering and/or transmission is likely in some objects.