Proposition 6

Propostion 6 is more commonly referred to as the Briggs Initiative because it was the conservative state legislator John Briggs who passionately followed the lead of Florida's Anita Bryant; both Bryant and Briggs felt that homosexuals should be banned from working within the school system for fear that it was encourage children to "be gay". No on 6 was a campaign lead by Gwen Craig and Bill Krause who had been appointed by Milk (SF Supervisor) and Ammiano (teacher). Contrary to popular belief (based off the film Milk), Harvey Milk would assist in the campaigning against 6 and hold debates against Briggs, but he handed over the power to Craig and Krause. The best tool used by the campaign was the encouragement of gays and lesbians to come out to family and friends, which rippled outside of California and spread over the rest of the nation. The No on 6 slogan? "Come out! Come out! Wherever you are!" and that was exactly what happened. A poll had been taken at the beginning of September that year and 61% of the voters were for proposition 6 while only 31% were against; by the end of the month there was the largest shift of votes in the history of politics, morphing into 45% planning on voting YES, 43% voting NO, and 31% were now undecided. Support against the Briggs Initiative started pouring in from multiple politicians, including President Carter and Ronald Reagan, the former Govenor of California at the time who was just beginning his election process for President.

When the votes were finally placed and counted, 58.4% had voted NO while only 41.6% voted YES (all others were invalid).

...to be continued...