The history of LGBT residents in California, which includes centuries prior to the 20th, has become increasingly visible recently with the successes of the LGBT rights movement. In spite of the strong development of early
LGBT villages in the state, pro-LGBT activists in California have campaigned against nearly 170 years of especially harsh prosecutions and punishments toward gays, lesbians, bisexuals, and transgender people.
19th century
Prior to 1850, the 1821 independence of Mexico largely resulted in the end of the colonial Spanish Inquisition and its violent anti-LGBT persecution in the then-Mexican territory of California. However, economically-driven settlement in the region by United States citizens resulted in the import of historically-English anti-sodomy laws from their home country, which was cemented by the U.S. annexation of California in 1848. In 1850, a common-law statute was installed in the territory of California, providing for the illegalization of sodomy and setting the penalty at five years to life. An 1855 law expanded the crime of sodomy to include "assault with an intent to commit" sodomy, penalizing the crime with 1–14 years imprisonment.
A new criminal code, passed in 1872, retained the prior restrictions on sodomy without substantial change, but replaced common-law assumptions regarding "crimes against nature" with more explicit language regarding sodomy.
Successful challenges to convictions for sodomy included ''People v. Hickey'' (1895), in which the Supreme Court struck down a sodomy conviction because the trial court did not inform the jury that an assault to commit sodomy could only be considered a simple assault, and ''People v. Boyle'' (1897), in which a court ruled that
fellatio
Fellatio (also known as fellation, and in slang as blowjob, BJ, giving head, or sucking off) is an oral sex act involving a person stimulating the penis of another person by using the mouth, throat, or both. Oral stimulation of the scrotum may ...
did not constitute a "crime against nature" (as per a prior case in Texas).
20th century
1900–1919
Between 1900 and 1902, 20 cases of sodomy were brought before the criminal courts in California, resulting in 16 convictions; 10 of these cases had taken place in the City and County of San Francisco, while 6 more had taken place in neighboring counties.
In fall of 1914, some 500 gay men were arrested as "social vagrants", leading to the legislative passage of a unique law which prohibited "acts technically known as fellatio and
cunnilingus
Cunnilingus is an oral sex act performed by a person on the vulva or vagina of another person. The clitoris is the most sexually sensitive part of the human female genitalia, and its stimulation may result in a woman becoming sexually aroused ...
." The law, which set a maximum of 15 years in prison for either act, was the only statute law in the United States which ever mentioned the words "fellatio" and "cunnilingus".
The law against fellatio and cunnilingus would have interesting effects in the courts due to disputes regarding the exact medical definitions of both terms; the State Supreme Court rulings in ''In Re Application of Soady'' (1918) and ''Ex Parte Lockett'' (1919) would reveal the schism between the sitting justices, particularly Justices
Henry A. Melvin and
Curtis D. Wilbur, on those definitions.
1920–1939
In 1921, the penalty of sodomy was lowered to 1–10 years imprisonment. The same year, a constitutional amendment prohibiting oral sex (namely "the act of copulating the mouth of one person with the sexual organ of another") was passed, retaining the 15-year imprisonment as a penalty without regard to sexual orientation. Finally, a third act gave free rein to the government to prohibit and restrict any sexual activity, stating that "any act...which openly outrages public decency" would be punished.
As a result of these and prior laws, California became notorious for egregious invasions of privacy, with numerous cases of residential espionage by neighbors, family members, rivals or hired private investigators; the majority of these invasions (including the drilling of holes into walls) went unchallenged by defendants in court. In addition, beginning with a law in 1909 which allowed for the sterilization of convicted and imprisoned sex offenders if they showed recidivism in prison towards being a "moral or sexual pervert" (including those committed for sodomy, fellatio, or cunnilingus) the allowance for the sterilization of inmates became so extensive that by 1934, some 9,931 inmates had been sterilized.
A psychopathic offender law, the first to be enacted outside of the Midwestern United States, was passed in 1939, and would also add a further, constantly amended layer to California's laws regarding "perverts".
1940s
The 1940s and 1950s saw the initial coordinated forays into the provision of services for LGBT people in the state. In 1947, ''Vice Versa'', the first North American lesbian publication, was first written and self-published by
Lisa Ben
Edythe D. Eyde (November 7, 1921 – December 22, 2015) better known by her pen name Lisa Ben, was an American editor, author, active fantasy-fiction fan and fanzine contributor (often using the name Tigrina in these activities), and songwr ...
in Los Angeles. However, the first
sex offender registry
A sex offender registry is a system in various countries designed to allow government authorities to keep track of the activities of sex offenders, including those who have completed their criminal sentences. In some jurisdictions, registration i ...
law was enacted in 1947, requiring all persons convicted under California law for sexual crimes since 1944 to register as sex offenders.
Virginia Prince, a transgender person who began living full-time as a woman in San Francisco in the 1940s, developed a widespread correspondence network with transgender people throughout Europe and the United States by the 1950s. She worked closely with
Alfred Kinsey
Alfred Charles Kinsey (; June 23, 1894 – August 25, 1956) was an American sexologist, biologist, and professor of entomology and zoology who, in 1947, founded the Institute for Sex Research at Indiana University, now known as the Kinsey Instit ...
to bring the needs of transgender people to the attention of social scientists and sex reformers.
In 1952, using Virginia Prince's correspondence network for its initial subscription list, a handful of other transgender people in Southern California launched ''Transvestia: The Journal of the American Society for Equality in Dress'', which published two issues. The Society that launched the journal also only briefly existed in Southern California.
1950s
1950–1954
In 1950, The
Mattachine Society
The Mattachine Society (), founded in 1950, was an early national gay rights organization in the United States, perhaps preceded only by Chicago's Society for Human Rights. Communist and labor activist Harry Hay formed the group with a collection ...
, the first sustained American gay rights group, was founded in Los Angeles (November 11). In the spring of 1952, Dale Jennings was arrested for allegedly soliciting a police officer in a bathroom in Westlake Park, now known as
MacArthur Park
MacArthur Park (originally Westlake Park) is a park dating back to the late 19th century in the Westlake, Los Angeles, Westlake neighborhood of Los Angeles. In the early 1940s, it was renamed after General Douglas MacArthur, and later designated ...
. His trial drew national attention to the Mattachine Society, and membership increased dramatically after Jennings contested the charges, resulting in a hung jury. However, the same year, Governor
Earl Warren
Earl Warren (March 19, 1891 – July 9, 1974) was an American attorney, politician, and jurist who served as the 14th Chief Justice of the United States from 1953 to 1969. The Warren Court presided over a major shift in American constitution ...
, who would become the Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court in a year and a half, signed a law which eliminated the maximum penalty for sodomy ("not less than one year"), thus allowing for potential life imprisonment.
The most famous individual to be arrested under the oral copulation and vagrancy law was civil rights activist
Bayard Rustin
Bayard Rustin (; March 17, 1912 – August 24, 1987) was an African American leader in social movements for civil rights, socialism, nonviolence, and gay rights.
Rustin worked with A. Philip Randolph on the March on Washington Movement, in 19 ...
, who received 60 days in jail in 1953 after pleading guilty in Pasadena to a lesser charge of "sex perversion" (as consensual sodomy was known in California at the time).
1955–1959
The
Daughters of Bilitis
The Daughters of Bilitis , also called the DOB or the Daughters, was the first lesbian civil and political rights organization in the United States. The organization, formed in San Francisco in 1955, was conceived as a social alternative to lesb ...
(DOB) was founded in San Francisco in 1955 by four lesbian couples (including
Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon
Dorothy Louise Taliaferro "Del" Martin (May 5, 1921 – August 27, 2008) and Phyllis Ann Lyon (November 10, 1924 – April 9, 2020) were an American lesbian couple known as feminist and gay-rights activists.
Martin and Lyon met in 1950 ...
) and was the first national lesbian political and social organization in the United States.
[social sciences - Daughters of Bilitis](_blank)
. glbtq (October 20, 2005). Retrieved on 2010-11-30.
The 1956 appellate court case ''People v. Giani'' stood out against the majority of judicial cases which sent numerous people to prison or involuntary psychiatric incarceration for a wide variety of sexual offenses; Justice Fred V. Wood noted for a unanimous court that based on "the absence of expert medical testimony on the subject we hesitate to equate the word 'homosexual' with the term 'sexual psychopath,'" and called for a new trial for the defendant. The 1957 case ''People v. Goldstein'', in which Edward Goldstein had been convicted by a prior court for performing fellatio on a brick layer, a sailor and "sailors from
Moffett Field
Moffett Federal Airfield , also known as Moffett Field, is a joint civil-military airport located in an Local government in California#Counties, unincorporated part of Santa Clara County, California, Santa Clara County, California, United States, ...
", resulted in an overturn of the conviction by an appellate court due to numerous discrepancies in the initial conviction.
In 1958, psychiatrist
Karl Bowman requested that the California legislature repeal all laws criminalizing homosexuality, although it would be some two decades before the legislature would act.
1960s
1960–1964
The first break in the regime of California sex laws took place in 1961, when the legislature replaced the vagrancy law with a "disorderly conduct" law. Also in 1961,
José Sarria
José Julio Sarria (December 13, 1922 – August 19, 2013), also known as The Grand Mere, Absolute Empress I de San Francisco, and the Widow Norton, was an American political activist from San Francisco, California, who in 1961 became the fir ...
became the first openly gay candidate for public office in the United States when he ran for the
San Francisco Board of Supervisors
The San Francisco Board of Supervisors is the legislative body within the government of the City and County of San Francisco.
Government and politics
The City and County of San Francisco is a consolidated city-county, being simultaneously a c ...
. ''
The Rejected
''The Rejected'' is a made-for-television documentary film about homosexuality, produced for KQED in San Francisco by John W. Reavis.Kaiser, p. 161 ''The Rejected'' was the first documentary program on homosexuality broadcast on American televis ...
'', the first documentary on homosexuality, is broadcast on KQED TV in San Francisco on September 11, 1961.
The first LGBT business association, the
Tavern Guild, was established in 1962.
In 1964, ''
Life
Life is a quality that distinguishes matter that has biological processes, such as signaling and self-sustaining processes, from that which does not, and is defined by the capacity for growth, reaction to stimuli, metabolism, energ ...
'' magazine named San Francisco the "Gay Capital of the U.S."
1965–1969
In 1965, José Sarria established the
Imperial Court System
The International Imperial Court System (IICS) also known as the International Court System is one of the oldest and largest LGBT organizations in the world. The Imperial Court System is a grassroots network of organizations that works to build ...
, which is now one of the largest LGBT charity organizations in the world.
In 1965
Vanguard
The vanguard (also called the advance guard) is the leading part of an advancing military formation. It has a number of functions, including seeking out the enemy and securing ground in advance of the main force.
History
The vanguard derives fr ...
was founded by Adrian Ravarour and San Francisco Tenderloin youth for gay rights. The following year, in 1966, one of the first recorded transgender riots in US history took place. The
Compton's Cafeteria Riot
The Compton's Cafeteria riot occurred in August 1966 in the Tenderloin, San Francisco, California, Tenderloin district of San Francisco. The riot was a response to the violent and constant police harassment of drag queens and trans people, partic ...
occurred in the Tenderloin district of San Francisco.
The night after the riot, more transgender people, hustlers, Tenderloin street people, and other members of the
LGBT
' is an initialism that stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender. In use since the 1990s, the initialism, as well as some of its common variants, functions as an umbrella term for sexuality and gender identity.
The LGBT term is a ...
community joined in a
picket of the cafeteria, which would not allow transgender people back in.
The demonstration ended with the newly installed plate-glass windows being smashed again. According to the online encyclopedia
glbtq.com
glbtq.com (also known as the glbtq Encyclopedia Project) was an online encyclopedia of gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, and queer ( GLBTQ) culture. Launched in 2003, it was edited by Claude J. Summers, emeritus professor at the University of ...
, "In the aftermath of the riot at Compton's, a network of transgender social, psychological, and medical support services was established, which culminated in 1968 with the creation of the
National Transsexual Counseling Unit
National may refer to:
Common uses
* Nation or country
** Nationality – a ''national'' is a person who is subject to a nation, regardless of whether the person has full rights as a citizen
Places in the United States
* National, Maryland, ce ...
(NTCU), the first such peer-run support and advocacy organization in the world".
On New Year's Eve 1967, a raid by undercover
LAPD
The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD), officially known as the City of Los Angeles Police Department, is the municipal police department of Los Angeles, California. With 9,974 police officers and 3,000 civilian staff, it is the third-large ...
officers on the
Black Cat Tavern
The Black Cat Tavern is an LGBT historic site located in the Silver Lake neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. In 1967, it was the site of one of the first demonstrations in the United States protesting police brutality against LGBT people, pre ...
in Los Angeles, California, a gay bar, ended in several beatings and the arrests of 16 people. The violence of the police raid caused push back from bar goers including those at another bar, New Faces, located down the street, where officers knocked down the owner, a woman, and beat two bartenders unconscious.
This incident inspired a civil demonstration on February 11, 1967, of about 200 people to protest the raids. The demonstration was organized by a group called
PRIDE
Pride is defined by Merriam-Webster as "reasonable self-esteem" or "confidence and satisfaction in oneself". A healthy amount of pride is good, however, pride sometimes is used interchangeably with "conceit" or "arrogance" (among other words) wh ...
(Personal Rights in Defense and Education) – founded by Steve Ginsberg – and the SCCRH (Southern California Council on Religion and Homophile). The protest was met by squadrons of armed policemen.
The LAPD also began enforcing
Rule No. 9 in 1967, a
city ordinance
A local ordinance is a law issued by a local government. such as a municipality, county, parish, prefecture, or the like.
China
In Hong Kong, all laws enacted by the territory's Legislative Council remain to be known as ''Ordinances'' () af ...
in
Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...
which made it illegal for performers to "impersonate by means of costume or dress a member of the opposite sex" without a special permit from the
Los Angeles Board of Police Commissioners
The Los Angeles Board of Police Commissioners, also commonly known as the Los Angeles Police Commission, is a five-member body of civilian-only, appointed officials which oversees the Los Angeles Police Department.
Organization
The board is made ...
. The ordinance was notably used to prevent transgender dancer
Sir Lady Java
Sir Lady Java, also known simply as Lady Java (born 1943) is an American transgender rights activist, exotic dancer, singer, comedian, and actress. Active on stage, television, radio and film from the mid-1960s to 1970s, she is a popular and inf ...
from performing.
One of the earliest organizations for bisexuals, the Sexual Freedom League in San Francisco, was facilitated by Margo Rila and Frank Esposito beginning in 1967.
Two years later, during a staff meeting at a San Francisco mental health facility serving LGBT people, nurse Maggi Rubenstein came out as bisexual. Due to this, bisexuals began to be included in the facility's programs for the first time.
The first congregation of the
Metropolitan Community Church
The Metropolitan Community Church (MCC), also known as the Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches (UFMCC), is an international LGBT-affirming mainline Protestant Christian denomination. There are 222 member congregations in 37 ...
, an LGBT-affirming denomination, was founded in 1968 in Los Angeles by
Troy Perry
Troy Deroy Perry Jr (born July 27, 1940) is the founder of the Metropolitan Community Church, with a ministry with the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender communities, in Los Angeles on October 6, 1968.
Early life
Troy Perry is the eldest o ...
.
On Halloween night in 1969 a riot broke out in San Francisco between the GLF (Gay Liberation Front) and the newspaper ''San Francisco Examiner''. The ''Examiner'' was publishing anti-gay articles and the full names and addresses of gay men who had been arrested in bars, clubs, or tearooms. (tearooms were places throughout the city gay men used to have sex). When the GLF crowded outside the Examiner and started to chant and riot, employees from a few stories up in the building dumped large containers of ink onto the protesters. GLF used this ink to mark up the newspapers outside and scrawl messages like ‘Gay Power’ around the city, leaving purple ink handprints everywhere. This night has come to be referred to as ‘Friday of the Purple Hand’ or ‘Bloody Friday of the Purple Hand’.
On December 31, 1969,
The Cockettes
The Cockettes were an avant garde psychedelic hippie theater group founded by Hibiscus (George Edgerly Harris III) in the fall of 1969. The troupe was formed out of a group of hippie artists, men and women, who were living in Kaliflower, one of ...
, a psychedelic drag queen troupe, performed for the first time at the Palace Theatre on Union and Columbus in the North Beach neighborhood of San Francisco.
1970s
1970–1974
In 1970, the first LGBT
Pride Parade
A pride parade (also known as pride march, pride event, or pride festival) is an outdoor event celebrating lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer culture, queer (LGBTQ) social and self-acceptance, achievements, LGBT rights by country o ...
was held in
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
on June 28, 1970, the one year anniversary of the
Stonewall Riots
The Stonewall riots (also known as the Stonewall uprising, Stonewall rebellion, or simply Stonewall) were a series of spontaneous protests by members of the gay community in response to a police raid that began in the early morning hours of Ju ...
. Gay Pride marches also took place in Los Angeles and Chicago, and the first "Gay-in" held in San Francisco.
On April 1, 1971, the
Bay Area Reporter
The ''Bay Area Reporter'' is a free weekly newspaper serving the LGBT communities in the San Francisco Bay Area. It is one of the largest-circulation LGBT newspapers in the United States, and the country's oldest continuously published newspaper ...
, a free weekly newspaper serving the
gay
''Gay'' is a term that primarily refers to a homosexual person or the trait of being homosexual. The term originally meant 'carefree', 'cheerful', or 'bright and showy'.
While scant usage referring to male homosexuality dates to the late 1 ...
,
lesbian
A lesbian is a Homosexuality, homosexual woman.Zimmerman, p. 453. The word is also used for women in relation to their sexual identity or sexual behavior, regardless of sexual orientation, or as an adjective to characterize or associate n ...
,
bisexual
Bisexuality is a romantic or sexual attraction or behavior toward both males and females, or to more than one gender. It may also be defined to include romantic or sexual attraction to people regardless of their sex or gender identity, whi ...
, and
transgender
A transgender (often abbreviated as trans) person is someone whose gender identity or gender expression does not correspond with their sex assigned at birth. Many transgender people experience dysphoria, which they seek to alleviate through tr ...
(
LGBT
' is an initialism that stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender. In use since the 1990s, the initialism, as well as some of its common variants, functions as an umbrella term for sexuality and gender identity.
The LGBT term is a ...
) communities in the
San Francisco Bay Area
The San Francisco Bay Area, often referred to as simply the Bay Area, is a populous region surrounding the San Francisco, San Pablo, and Suisun Bay estuaries in Northern California. The Bay Area is defined by the Association of Bay Area Go ...
, was co-founded by
Bob Ross
Robert Norman Ross (October 29, 1942 – July 4, 1995) was an American painter, art instructor, and television host. He was the creator and host of ''The Joy of Painting'', an instructional television program that aired from 1983 to 1994 on ...
and Paul Bentley. It is one of the largest LGBT newspapers by circulation in the United States and the country's oldest continuously published newspaper of its kind. It was known by locals for most of its history by the initials ''B.A.R.'' that were included in its nameplate until April 2011 and was originally distributed to gay bars in the
South of Market
South of Market (SoMa) is a neighborhood in San Francisco, California, situated just south of Market Street. It contains several sub-neighborhoods including South Beach, Yerba Buena, and Rincon Hill.
SoMa is home to many of the city's museums ...
,
Castro District
The Castro District, commonly referred to as the Castro, is a neighborhood in Eureka Valley in San Francisco. The Castro was one of the first gay neighborhoods in the United States. Having transformed from a working-class neighborhood throug ...
, and
Polk Gulch
Polk Street (also sometimes referred to by its German name, ''Polkstrasse'') is a street in San Francisco, California, that travels northward from Market Street to Beach Street and is one of the main thoroughfares of the Polk Gulch neighborhood ...
areas of San Francisco. Today, the paper is distributed throughout the Bay Area and beyond.
In 1972 San Francisco, California became one of the first cities in the United States to pass a gay rights ordinance.
Privacy
Privacy (, ) is the ability of an individual or group to seclude themselves or information about themselves, and thereby express themselves selectively.
The domain of privacy partially overlaps with security, which can include the concepts of a ...
was appended to the California Constitution's Declaration of Rights for the first time, protecting gay people from being outed by certain public organizations.
In 1973 lesbian
Beth Elliott
Beth Elliott (born 1950) is an American trans lesbian folk singer, activist, and writer. In the early 1970s Elliot was involved with the Daughters of Bilitis and the West Coast Lesbian Conference in California. She became the centre of a controv ...
was ejected from the West Coast Women's Conference because she was a transgender woman, following
Robin Morgan
Robin Morgan (born January 29, 1941) is an American poet, writer, activist, journalist, lecturer and former child actor. Since the early 1960s, she has been a key radical feminist member of the American Women's Movement, and a leader in the ...
's keynote address which denounced Elliott as a man and an infiltrator.
In 1975, a
Consenting Adult Sex Bill was passed in California
due to an extensive lobbying effort led by State Assemblyman from San Francisco
Willie Brown. It did not repeal existing sodomy or oral copulation laws, but it did exclude private consensual activity between adults over the age of 18 from the reach of such laws. A further law in the same year reduced the maximum penalty for consensual sex with minors under the age of 18 to five years. Both laws essentially rendered the psychopathic offender laws moot, but the prohibitions on disorderly conduct and consensual relations between prisoners remained.
In 1976 Harriet Levi and Maggi Rubenstein founded the San Francisco Bisexual Center.
It was the longest surviving bisexual community center, offering counseling and support services to Bay Area bisexuals, as well as publishing a newsletter, ''The Bi Monthly'', from 1976 to 1984.
In 1977,
Harvey Milk
Harvey Bernard Milk (May 22, 1930 – November 27, 1978) was an American politician and the first openly gay man to be elected to public office in California, as a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. Milk was born and raised in N ...
was elected city-county supervisor in San Francisco, becoming the third openly gay American elected to public office and the first in California. Both he and Mayor
George Moscone
George Richard Moscone (; November 24, 1929 – November 27, 1978) was an American attorney and Democratic politician. He was the 37th mayor of San Francisco, California from January 1976 until his assassination in November 1978. He was known ...
were
assassinated by former Supervisor Dan White the next year. The controversy over the acquittal of White resulted in the 1979
White Night riots
The White Night riots were a series of violent events sparked by an announcement of a lenient sentencing of Dan White for the assassinations of George Moscone, the mayor of San Francisco, and of Harvey Milk, a member of the city's Board of Supe ...
in San Francisco.
AB 607, by Orange County Assemblyman Bruce Nestande, passes 23–5 in the Senate and 68–2 in the House and defines marriage as "between one man and one woman". The change came after same-sex couples seeking marital recognition apply in Orange County courthouses for marriage licenses alarming the clerks there. Opponents included Assemblyman Willie Brown and Senator Milton Marks.
In 1978,
Samois
Samois was a lesbian- feminist BDSM organization based in San Francisco that existed from 1978 to 1983. It was the first lesbian BDSM group in the United States. It took its name from Samois-sur-Seine, the location of the fictional estate of Ann ...
the earliest known lesbian-feminist BDSM organization is founded in San Francisco. The anti-gay
Briggs Initiative
California Proposition 6, informally known as the Briggs Initiative, was a ballot initiative put to a referendum on the California state ballot in the November 7, 1978 election. It was sponsored by John Briggs, a conservative state legislator ...
which would have banned gays from serving as public school teachers is defeated by California voters. Harvey Milk was instrumental in fighting the measure and opposition from Ronald Reagan helped defeat it. In 1979,
Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...
passed its first homosexual rights bill with no fanfare from Tom Bradley but much support from arts.
In October 1979, the ''
San Francisco Bay Times
The San Francisco Bay Times, the first LGBTQ newspaper founded jointly and equally by gay men and women, launched in 1978 and remains one of the largest and oldest LGBTQ newspapers in Northern California. The business includes the 24/7 live-stream ...
'', a free weekly
LGBT
' is an initialism that stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender. In use since the 1990s, the initialism, as well as some of its common variants, functions as an umbrella term for sexuality and gender identity.
The LGBT term is a ...
newspaper in San Francisco, California, started as ''Coming Up!''. ''Coming Up!'' was billed as "the gay lesbian newspaper and calendar of events for the Bay Area."
["Lesbian and Gay Archives of New Zealand - Serials Holdings List"](_blank)
Retrieved on June 8, 2007.
1980s
In 1982, Laguna Beach, CA elected the first openly gay mayor in United States history. The first Gay Games was also held in San Francisco that year, attracting 1,600 participants.
In 1982, Armand Boulay and Tom Brougham (who coined the term "domestic partnership") founded a political club in Alameda County (Oakland, Berkeley, etc.) in the Bay Area that later became the East Bay Stonewall Democratic Club.
In 1983, the Oakland City Council passes a Gay Rights Ordinance prohibiting discrimination.
In 1983, BiPOL, the first and oldest bisexual political organization, was founded in San Francisco by bisexual activists Autumn Courtney,
Lani Ka'ahumanu
Lani is a given name. Notable people with the name include: Given name
* Lani Belcher (born 1989), British canoeist
* Lani Billard (born 1979), Canadian actress and singer
* Lani Brockman (born 1956), American theater actress and director
* L ...
, Arlene Krantz, David Lourea, Bill Mack,
Alan Rockway
The Rockway Institute is a center for LGBT research and public policy based at the California School of Professional Psychology at Alliant International University in San Francisco, California. It was founded in 2007 and named for bisexual clinical ...
, and Maggi Rubenstein.
In 1984, BiPOL sponsored the first bisexual rights rally, outside the
Democratic National Convention
The Democratic National Convention (DNC) is a series of presidential nominating conventions held every four years since 1832 by the United States Democratic Party. They have been administered by the Democratic National Committee since the 1852 ...
in San Francisco. The rally featured nine speakers from civil rights groups allied with the bisexual movement.
Also in 1984, Berkeley, California became the first city in the U.S. to adopt a program of domestic partnership health benefits for city employees.
West Hollywood, CA
West Hollywood is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. Incorporated in 1984, it is home to the Sunset Strip. As of the 2020 United States Census, 2020 U.S. Census, its population was 35,757. It is considered one of the most ...
was also founded that year, and became the first known city to elect a city council where a majority of the members were openly gay or lesbian.
Also in 1984, bisexual activist David Lourea finally persuaded the San Francisco Department of Public Health to recognize bisexual men in their official AIDS statistics (the weekly "New AIDS cases and mortality statistics" report), after two years of campaigning. Health departments throughout the United States began to recognize bisexual men because of this, whereas before they had mostly only recognized gay men.
In 1986 Autumn Courtney from BiPOL (the first and oldest bisexual political organization) was elected co-chair of San Francisco's Lesbian Gay Freedom Day Pride Parade Committee; she was the first openly bisexual person to hold this sort of position in the United States.
In 1987, the
Bay Area Bisexual Network
Bay Area Bi+ & Pan Network (BABPN), previously known as Bay Area Bisexual Network (BABN), is a social and networking group in the San Francisco Bay Area. It is the oldest and largest bisexual group in the San Francisco Bay Area. Since 1987 BABN ha ...
, the oldest and largest bisexual group in the San Francisco Bay Area, was founded by
Lani Ka'ahumanu
Lani is a given name. Notable people with the name include: Given name
* Lani Belcher (born 1989), British canoeist
* Lani Billard (born 1979), Canadian actress and singer
* Lani Brockman (born 1956), American theater actress and director
* L ...
,
Ann Justi and Maggi Rubenstein.
On October 6, 1989, the San Francisco Police Department initiated a police riot following a peaceful demonstration held by ACT UP to protest the United States government's actions during the AIDS pandemic. The event, known as the
Castro Sweep, led to multiple arrests and injuries as police officers swept through the Castro District, a gay village in the city.
1990s
The 1990s and 2000s saw the incremental expansion of civil rights for LGBT individuals, but same-sex couples' rights became an increasingly controversial topic, with referendums and judicial cases on
same-sex marriage
Same-sex marriage, also known as gay marriage, is the marriage of two people of the same Legal sex and gender, sex or gender. marriage between same-sex couples is legally performed and recognized in 33 countries, with the most recent being ...
jousting for constitutional finality.
In 1990 the oldest national bisexuality organization in the United States,
BiNet USA
BiNet USA (officially Bi/Net USA, The Bisexual Network of the USA Inc.) was an American national nonprofit bisexual community whose mission was to "facilitate the development of a cohesive network of bisexual communities, promote bisexual visibi ...
, was founded. It was originally called the North American Multicultural Bisexual Network (NAMBN), and had its first meeting at the first National Bisexual Conference in America, which was held in San Francisco, and sponsored by BiPOL.
Bisexual health was one of eight workshop tracks at the conference, and the "NAMES Project" quilt was displayed with bisexual quilt pieces. Over 450 people attended from 20 states and 5 countries, and the mayor of San Francisco sent a proclamation "commending the bisexual rights community for its leadership in the cause of social justice," and declaring June 23, 1990 Bisexual Pride Day.
In 1994,
Sheila Kuehl
Sheila James Kuehl (born February 9, 1941) is an American politician and retired actress, and served as the member of the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors for the 3rd District and as board chair and chair pro tem. Kuehl was California's ...
became the first openly LGBT member of the
California State Legislature
The California State Legislature is a bicameral state legislature consisting of a lower house, the California State Assembly, with 80 members; and an upper house, the California State Senate, with 40 members. Both houses of the Legisla ...
.
In 1996 the
San Francisco LGBT Community Center
The San Francisco LGBT Community Center, also known as the SF LGBT Center, is a nonprofit organization serving the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer community of San Francisco, California, and nearby communities, located at 1800 Marke ...
was incorporated, and it opened its solar-powered, 35,000-square-foot (3,300 m2) facility in 2002. Its mission is "to connect our diverse community to opportunities, resources and each other to achieve our vision of a stronger, healthier, and more equitable world for LGBT people and our allies."
In 1999, California adopted a domestic partnership law.
In 2000, the state passed
Proposition 22, which restricted state recognition of marriage to opposite-sex couples.
21st century
![CA LGBT legislators](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/ae/CA_LGBT_legislators.png)
In June 2002 the
California Legislative LGBT Caucus
The California Legislative LGBTQ Caucus (formerly the California Legislative LGBT Caucus) is an American political organization formed in June 2002 and composed of openly lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender members of the California State Leg ...
was founded; it is an American political organization composed of openly
lesbian
A lesbian is a Homosexuality, homosexual woman.Zimmerman, p. 453. The word is also used for women in relation to their sexual identity or sexual behavior, regardless of sexual orientation, or as an adjective to characterize or associate n ...
,
gay
''Gay'' is a term that primarily refers to a homosexual person or the trait of being homosexual. The term originally meant 'carefree', 'cheerful', or 'bright and showy'.
While scant usage referring to male homosexuality dates to the late 1 ...
,
bisexual
Bisexuality is a romantic or sexual attraction or behavior toward both males and females, or to more than one gender. It may also be defined to include romantic or sexual attraction to people regardless of their sex or gender identity, whi ...
and
transgender
A transgender (often abbreviated as trans) person is someone whose gender identity or gender expression does not correspond with their sex assigned at birth. Many transgender people experience dysphoria, which they seek to alleviate through tr ...
members of the
California State Legislature
The California State Legislature is a bicameral state legislature consisting of a lower house, the California State Assembly, with 80 members; and an upper house, the California State Senate, with 40 members. Both houses of the Legisla ...
.
This group is contrasted to other LGBT Equality Caucuses in that the California caucus consists entirely of LGBT legislators while other LGBT Equality Caucuses consist of all orientations. Both, however, promote the promulgation of LGBT-affirming laws within the legislature.
In 2003
Theresa Sparks
Theresa Sparks is an American transgender woman, and is the Executive Director of the San Francisco Human Rights Commission and was a candidate for San Francisco Supervisor for District 6 in the November 2010 election. She is a former president of ...
was the first openly transgender woman ever named "Woman of the Year" by the California State Assembly, and in 2007 she was elected president of the
San Francisco Police Commission The San Francisco Police Commission is the governing body of the San Francisco Police Department.
2020 meeting
The Police Commission heard testimony from SFPD Chief Bill Scott about arrests at protests against police brutality triggered by the ...
by a single vote, making her the first openly transgender person ever to be elected president of any San Francisco commission, as well as San Francisco's highest ranking openly transgender official.
[McMillan, Dennis]
Sparks Is First Trans Person to Lead Major Commission
San Francisco Bay Times
The San Francisco Bay Times, the first LGBTQ newspaper founded jointly and equally by gay men and women, launched in 1978 and remains one of the largest and oldest LGBTQ newspapers in Northern California. The business includes the 24/7 live-stream ...
(May 17, 2007). Retrieved on October 15, 2007.
Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon
Dorothy Louise Taliaferro "Del" Martin (May 5, 1921 – August 27, 2008) and Phyllis Ann Lyon (November 10, 1924 – April 9, 2020) were an American lesbian couple known as feminist and gay-rights activists.
Martin and Lyon met in 1950 ...
became the first same-sex couple to be legally married in California, and in the entire United States, in 2004, when San Francisco mayor Gavin Newsom allowed city hall to grant marriage licenses to same-sex couples. Eventually all of these marriages were voided by the
California Supreme Court
The Supreme Court of California is the highest and final court of appeals in the courts of the U.S. state of California. It is headquartered in San Francisco at the Earl Warren Building, but it regularly holds sessions in Los Angeles and Sacra ...
. However, after the California Supreme Court decision in 2008 that granted same-sex couples in California the right to marry, Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon remarried, and were again the first same-sex couple in the state to marry. Later in 2008 Proposition 8 illegalized same-sex marriage in California until 2013 (see below), but the marriages that occurred between the California Supreme Court decision legalizing same-sex marriage and the approval of Proposition 8 illegalizing it are still considered valid, including the marriage of Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon.
Also in 2004, the San Francisco
Trans March
Annual marches, protests or gatherings take place around the world for transgender issues, often taking place during the time of local Pride parades for LGBT people. These events are frequently organized by trans communities to build community, ad ...
was first held.
It has been held annually since; it is San Francisco's largest transgender Pride event and one of the largest trans events in the entire world.
In 2005, domestic partnerships in California were upgraded to where they had almost exactly same rights as heterosexual married couples. California state legislators became the first in the nation to pass a same sex marriage law, but it was vetoed by Governor Schwarzenegger.
In 2007, California became the first US state to allow same-sex couples to visit each other in conjugal visits. On August 27, 2007, Don Norte, one of the first openly gay Republican
appointees
to a governing body in Sacramento, was appointed by California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger
to the California Governor's Committee on Employment of People with Disabilities.
Don Norte and Kevin Norte's association as grassroots leaders with Log Cabin Republicans (LCR) against the Proposition 8 ballot movement on a State level was documented by Ryan J. Davis. Ryan J. Davis,
9Davis flew out to Hollywood near the end of February to join a coalition of gay activists to lobby Gov. Schwarzenegger and First Lady Maria Shriver to publicly oppose the Family Research Council's Anti-Gay Marriage initiative.
0According to Davis, one of the group's main organizers, Kevin Norte, wrote on The California Log Cabin blog, "Someone had to fire the first shot. We did. We had some powerhouses there and the message was clear. We were not going away."
1
As reported in ''The Huffington Post'', the coalition
2had a broad base, including Matt Foreman (former executive director, The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force), Damon Romine (former entertainment media director, GLAAD), Geoff Kors (former executive director, Equality California), Charles Robbins (executive director, The Trevor Project), John Duran (president, Equality California, and city councilperson West Hollywood), Charles Moran, the Log Cabin Republicans' former LA Chapter president and LCR-CA VP, 2010, James Vaughn (former LCR CA director)], and the organizers, Don Norte (Governor's Committee on Labor for People With Disabilities) and Kevin Norte (LCR CA member, and former LCR-PAC board of directors).
3
On April 11, 2008, Governor Schwarzenegger officially announced his opposition to the initiative at LCR's National Convention.
4At Log Cabin's 2009 convention, Kevin Norte received the group's "Grassroots Leader Award".
2008–present
In May 2008, the California Supreme Court struck down Proposition 22 in ''
In re Marriage Cases
''In re Marriage Cases'', 43 Cal. 4th 757 (Cal. 2008) was a California Supreme Court case where the court held that laws treating classes of persons differently based on sexual orientation should be subject to strict judicial scrutiny, and that ...
''. On June 2, 2008,
Proposition 8
Proposition 8, known informally as Prop 8, was a California ballot proposition and a constitutional amendment, state constitutional amendment intended to ban same-sex marriage; it passed in the California state elections, November 2008, Novem ...
qualified for the November ballot in California. On June 16, 2008, same sex marriage became legal in California. On November 4, 2008, the Supreme Court ruling was struck down by when Proposition 8 passed in California, resulting in nationwide protests and judicial cases. Proposition 8 added the void text of Proposition 22 that "only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California" into the
California Constitution
The Constitution of California ( es, Constitución de California) is the primary organizing law for the U.S. state of California, describing the duties, powers, structures and functions of the government of California. California's original co ...
. On November 5, 2008, Proposition 8 went into effect.
In October 2009, LGBT activist Amy Andre
was appointed as executive director of the
San Francisco Pride Celebration Committee, making her San Francisco Pride's first bisexual woman of color executive director.
Also in 2009, the Supreme Court upheld Proposition 8 in ''
Strauss v. Horton'' but also upheld the same sex marriages that were performed between June 16 to November 5. In 2010, however, ''
Perry v. Schwarzenegger
Perry, also known as pear cider, is an alcoholic beverage made from fermented pears, traditionally the perry pear. It has been common for centuries in England, particularly in Gloucestershire, Herefordshire, and Worcestershire. It is also mad ...
'' resulted in a victory for same-sex couples, by declaring Proposition 8 unconstitutional.
In 2011, the State Legislature passed the
FAIR Education Act, which makes California the first state in the Union to enforce the teaching of LGBT history and social sciences in the public school curriculum and prohibits educational discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity.
Also in 2011, San Francisco's Human Rights Commission released a report on bisexual visibility, titled “Bisexual Invisibility: Impacts and Regulations.” This was the first time any governmental body released such a report. The report showed, among other things, that self-identified bisexuals made up the largest single population within the LGBT community in the United States. In each study included in the report, more women identified as bisexual than lesbian, though fewer men identified as bisexual than gay.
In February 2012 the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld ''
Perry v. Schwarzenegger
Perry, also known as pear cider, is an alcoholic beverage made from fermented pears, traditionally the perry pear. It has been common for centuries in England, particularly in Gloucestershire, Herefordshire, and Worcestershire. It is also mad ...
''.
In September 2012 Berkeley, California became the first city in America to officially proclaim a day recognizing bisexuals.
[Alt URL]
/ref> The Berkeley City Council unanimously and without discussion declared September 23 as Bisexual Pride and Bi Visibility Day.
Also in 2012, California became the first state to sign a ban on therapy that claims to convert gay people into heterosexual. However, the law is as of 2013 held up in federal courts on first amendment grounds.
In 2013, in the case '' Hollingsworth v. Perry'' (formerly ''Perry v. Schwarzenegger
Perry, also known as pear cider, is an alcoholic beverage made from fermented pears, traditionally the perry pear. It has been common for centuries in England, particularly in Gloucestershire, Herefordshire, and Worcestershire. It is also mad ...
''), which was brought by a lesbian couple (Kristin Perry and Sandra Stier) and a gay male couple, the Supreme Court said the private sponsors of Proposition 8
Proposition 8, known informally as Prop 8, was a California ballot proposition and a constitutional amendment, state constitutional amendment intended to ban same-sex marriage; it passed in the California state elections, November 2008, Novem ...
did not have legal standing to appeal after the ballot measure was struck down by a federal judge in San Francisco, which made same-sex marriage legal again in California. Kristin Perry and Sandra Stier were married shortly afterward, making them the first same-sex couple to be married in California since Proposition 8 was overturned.
Also in 2013, California enacted America's first law protecting transgender students; the law, called the School Success and Opportunity Act, declares that every public school student in California from kindergarten to 12th grade must be "permitted to participate in sex-segregated school programs and activities, including athletic teams and competitions, and use facilities consistent with his or her gender identity, irrespective of the gender listed on the pupil's records."
In June 2014, Governor Brown signed SB 1306 repealed Proposition 22 and AB 607, bringing California statutory law into conformance with case law under the XIV amendment of the US constitution.
In 2018, Ricardo Lara
Ricardo Lara (born November 5, 1974) is an American politician who is currently serving as the 8th Insurance Commissioner of California. Lara was elected during the 2018 election, defeating former California insurance commissioner Steve Poizne ...
was elected as California's insurance commissioner, making him the first openly gay person elected to statewide office in California's history.
In November 2019, transgender community leader Lauren Pulido raised the transgender pride flag
The first transgender flag is a pride flag having five horizontal stripes of three colors—light blue, pink and white. It was designed by American trans woman Monica Helms in 1999 to represent the transgender community, organizations, and indi ...
over the California state capitol for Trans Day of Remembrance, reportedly the first time the transgender flag was raised over a state capitol building in the United States.
In 2022, Nick Resnick became the first openly transgender person elected to help oversee a K-12 public school district in California, due to him being elected to the Oakland Unified School District board.
References
{{Portal bar, LGBT, California, History