If you have seen Milk, the biopic of slain San Francisco
City Supervisor Harvey Milk starring Sean Penn, then you will be
aware that much of the plot focuses on Milk’s efforts to defeat a
1978 California ballot initiative known as Proposition 6. This
initiative would be defeated that November and in the movie Milk
is given the lion’s share of the credit for its demise.
Had Proposition 6 (also known as the Briggs Initiative, as it was
initiated by Republican State Senator John Briggs) passed, it
would have become legal for teachers to be fired if it were known
they were gay or lesbian. A teacher could also be fired for
publicly supporting homosexuality.
There is little doubt Milk’s yeoman efforts against Proposition 6
were significant. Yet if it were not for the intervention of
Ronald Reagan the initiative would have almost certainly passed.
Milk, to its credit, notes Reagan’s opposition to
Proposition 6. However, its acknowledgement doesn’t properly do
justice to how significant Reagan’s contribution was to this
divisive debate. It is a shame given, the hostility directed
towards Reagan by the gay community to this very day due to his
perceived indifference to and inaction on AIDS.
Yet Reagan’s involvement in defeating Proposition 6 is not lost
on all in the gay community. David Mixner, an organizer for the
No forces in Los Angeles who would later become a top fundraiser
for Bill Clinton in his first bid for the White House, is
unambiguous in crediting Reagan for defeating Proposition 6.
Mixner
wrote in his blog last month:
Despite all our good work, everyone involved had taken the
Proposition from 75% in favor of firing homosexual school
teachers down to only 55%. We were having a helluva time
gaining that last 6%. We knew we needed something big to push
us over the top and we needed it soon since we were in the last
weeks of the campaign.
There is no doubt in my mind that the man who put us over the
top was California Governor Ronald Reagan. His opposition to
Proposition 6 killed it for sure.
Actually, Reagan had been out of office for more than three and a
half years when he jumped into the fray. Reagan stood absolutely
nothing to gain by getting involved in this fight. After all, he
did want to take one more stab at becoming the GOP standard
bearer for the White House in 1980. In opposing Proposition 6,
Reagan ran the risk of alienating a conservative base that had
been the bedrock of his support in two terms as Governor of
California. This would be especially true in Orange County, the
cradle of California conservatism. It was also the home base of
State Senator Briggs, who had ambitions to follow in Reagan’s
footsteps to Sacramento.
Reagan also risked running afoul of Anita Bryant. The
singer-turned-orange juice pitchwoman-turned-political activist
was squarely behind Proposition 6. Bryant founded and became the
spokeswoman for Save Our Children. She was as feared as she was
despised by the gay community. The year before, Bryant had
persuaded voters in Miami-Dade County to repeal an ordinance
prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.
Bryant would achieve similar victories in far flung places such
as Minneapolis-St. Paul, Wichita, and Eugene, Oregon. Bryant
appeared to be an unstoppable force. The sort of force Reagan
would need to become the GOP presidential nominee and could ill
afford to alienate.
In his book Stranger Among Friends, when Mixner learns
of an opportunity to meet with Reagan on the subject he jumps at
the chance. The meeting was arranged by a former Reagan staffer
who was a closeted homosexual. This former staffer would tell
Mixner to use libertarian arguments to make his case. He took
this advice to heart when he and his same sex partner Peter Scott
met with Reagan. Mixner argued Proposition 6 would lead to chaos
in the classroom because it would give students license to accuse
teachers of homosexuality when they received bad grades or in
retaliation for disciplinary measures. Reagan was receptive to
this argument and told Mixner and Scott, “This might be a good
day for you boys. Don’t think we can allow something like that to
happen here in California.” If Reagan didn’t like disorder at
Berkeley, he certainly didn’t want it in California’s elementary
schools either.
Reagan made his objections public first with an informal
statement to reporters late that September and again a few days
before the vote in a newspaper editorial in the Los Angeles
Herald-Examiner. It is clear Proposition 6 offended Reagan’s
libertarian sensibilities and put government in a place where it
did not belong. He writes,
“Since the measure does not restrict itself to the classroom,
every aspect of a teacher’s personal life could presumably come
under suspicion.” Reagan then asks, “What constitutes ‘advocacy’
of homosexuality? Would public opposition to Proposition 6 by a
teacher — should it pass — be considered advocacy?” In this
vein, Reagan would also argue that
Proposition 6 had “the potential of infringing on basic rights of
privacy and perhaps even constitutional rights.”
Nearly four million Californians would vote against Proposition
6, representing 58.4% of the vote. Significantly, a majority of
Orange County voters would join the rest of the state in opposing
the measure, effectively sounding the death knell not only for
Proposition 6 but for Briggs’ own political ambitions. Bryant
would also never again enjoy the same kind of public influence.
This would not have happened without Ronald Reagan.
The defeat of Proposition 6 might be summed up in this way.
Harvey Milk organized the gay community while Ronald Reagan took
care of everybody else. Sean Penn, alas, forgot to thank him
on accepting the best actor prize at the Academy Awards last
Sunday.
