diff -r 683a9aeb5d58 -r fbf2f56d225f Doc/library/urllib.request.rst
--- a/Doc/library/urllib.request.rst	Wed Jul 27 01:22:41 2011 +0200
+++ b/Doc/library/urllib.request.rst	Tue Jul 26 16:53:54 2011 -0700
@@ -132,7 +132,8 @@
 
 The following classes are provided:
 
-.. class:: Request(url, data=None, headers={}, origin_req_host=None, unverifiable=False)
+.. class:: Request(url, data=None, headers={}, origin_req_host=None, \
+                   unverifiable=False, method=None)
 
    This class is an abstraction of a URL request.
 
@@ -157,7 +158,7 @@
    :mod:`urllib`'s default user agent string is
    ``"Python-urllib/2.6"`` (on Python 2.6).
 
-   The final two arguments are only of interest for correct handling
+   The following two arguments are only of interest for correct handling
    of third-party HTTP cookies:
 
    *origin_req_host* should be the request-host of the origin
@@ -175,6 +176,9 @@
    document, and the user had no option to approve the automatic
    fetching of the image, this should be true.
 
+   *method* is the HTTP method to use (e.g. ``'GET'``, ``'POST'`` ...), if
+   *method* is ``None``, then the method will be ``'POST'`` is *data* is not
+   ``None``, otherwise ``'GET'`` (see :meth:`get_method`).
 
 .. class:: OpenerDirector()
 
@@ -379,7 +383,7 @@
 .. method:: Request.get_method()
 
    Return a string indicating the HTTP request method.  This is only meaningful for
-   HTTP requests, and currently always returns ``'GET'`` or ``'POST'``.
+   HTTP requests.
 
 
 .. method:: Request.has_data()
diff -r 683a9aeb5d58 -r fbf2f56d225f Lib/test/test_urllib2.py
--- a/Lib/test/test_urllib2.py	Wed Jul 27 01:22:41 2011 +0200
+++ b/Lib/test/test_urllib2.py	Tue Jul 26 16:53:54 2011 -0700
@@ -1385,6 +1385,13 @@
         self.assertEqual("POST", self.post.get_method())
         self.assertEqual("GET", self.get.get_method())
 
+        # Test explicit method
+        req = Request("http://python.org", method="POST")
+        self.assertEqual("POST", req.get_method())
+
+        req = Request("http://python.org", data="data", method="PUT")
+        self.assertEqual("PUT", req.get_method())
+
     def test_add_data(self):
         self.assertFalse(self.get.has_data())
         self.assertEqual("GET", self.get.get_method())
diff -r 683a9aeb5d58 -r fbf2f56d225f Lib/urllib/request.py
--- a/Lib/urllib/request.py	Wed Jul 27 01:22:41 2011 +0200
+++ b/Lib/urllib/request.py	Tue Jul 26 16:53:54 2011 -0700
@@ -177,7 +177,7 @@
 class Request:
 
     def __init__(self, url, data=None, headers={},
-                 origin_req_host=None, unverifiable=False):
+                 origin_req_host=None, unverifiable=False, method=None):
         # unwrap('<URL:type://host/path>') --> 'type://host/path'
         self.full_url = unwrap(url)
         self.full_url, self.fragment = splittag(self.full_url)
@@ -192,6 +192,7 @@
         self.origin_req_host = origin_req_host
         self.unverifiable = unverifiable
         self._parse()
+        self._method = method
 
     def _parse(self):
         self.type, rest = splittype(self.full_url)
@@ -202,10 +203,10 @@
             self.host = unquote(self.host)
 
     def get_method(self):
-        if self.data is not None:
-            return "POST"
-        else:
-            return "GET"
+        if self._method:
+            return self._method
+
+        return "GET" if self.data is None else "POST"
 
     # Begin deprecated methods