Harvey Milk
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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 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 ...
. Milk was born and raised in New York where he acknowledged his homosexuality as an adolescent, but chose to pursue sexual relationships with secrecy and discretion well into his adult years. His experience in the counterculture of the 1960s caused him to shed many of his conservative views about individual freedom and the expression of sexuality. Milk moved to San Francisco in 1972 and opened a camera store. Although he had been restless, holding an assortment of jobs and moving house frequently, he settled in The Castro, a neighborhood that was experiencing a mass immigration of gay men and lesbians. He was compelled to run for city supervisor in 1973, though he encountered resistance from the existing gay political establishment. His campaign was compared to theater; he was brash, outspoken, animated, and outrageous, earning media attention and votes, although not enough to be elected. He campaigned again in the next two supervisor elections, dubbing himself the "Mayor of Castro Street". Voters responded enough to warrant his running for the
California State Assembly The California State Assembly is the lower house of the California State Legislature, the upper house being the California State Senate. The Assembly convenes, along with the State Senate, at the California State Capitol in Sacramento. The ...
as well. Taking advantage of his growing popularity, he led the gay political movement in fierce battles against anti-gay initiatives. Milk was elected city supervisor in 1977 after San Francisco reorganized its election procedures to choose representatives from neighborhoods rather than through city-wide ballots. Milk served almost eleven months in office, during which he sponsored a bill banning discrimination in public accommodations, housing, and employment on the basis of sexual orientation. The Supervisors passed the bill by a vote of 11–1, and it was signed into law by Mayor George Moscone. On November 27, 1978, Milk and Moscone were
assassinated Assassination is the murder of a prominent or important person, such as a head of state, head of government, politician, world leader, member of a royal family or CEO. The murder of a celebrity, activist, or artist, though they may not have ...
by Dan White, a disgruntled former city supervisor who cast the sole vote against Milk's bill. Despite his short career in politics, Milk became an icon in San Francisco and a martyr in the gay community.Milk was described as a martyr by news outlets as early as 1979, by biographer Randy Shilts in 1982, and University of San Francisco professor Peter Novak in 2003. United Press International ctober 15, 1979 printed in the ''Edmonton Journal'', p. B10; Skelton, Nancy; Stein, Mark ctober 22, 1985br>S.F. Assassin Dan White Kills Himself
''Los Angeles Times'', Retrieved on February 3, 2012.; Shilts, p. 348; Nolte, Carl ovember 26, 2003 "City Hall Slayings: 25 Years Later", ''
The San Francisco Chronicle The ''San Francisco Chronicle'' is a newspaper serving primarily the San Francisco Bay Area of Northern California. It was founded in 1865 as ''The Daily Dramatic Chronicle'' by teenage brothers Charles de Young and Michael H. de Young. The p ...
'', p. A-1.
In 2002, Milk was called "the most famous and most significant openly
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 ...
official ever elected in the United States". Anne Kronenberg, his final campaign manager, wrote of him: "What set Harvey apart from you or me was that he was a visionary. He imagined a righteous world inside his head and then he set about to create it for real, for all of us." Milk was posthumously awarded the
Presidential Medal of Freedom The Presidential Medal of Freedom is the highest civilian award of the United States, along with the Congressional Gold Medal. It is an award bestowed by the president of the United States to recognize people who have made "an especially merit ...
in 2009.


Early life

Milk was born in the New York City suburb of Woodmere, to William Milk and Minerva Karns. He was the younger son of
Lithuanian Jewish Lithuanian Jews or Litvaks () are Jews with roots in the territory of the former Grand Duchy of Lithuania (covering present-day Lithuania, Belarus, Latvia, the northeastern Suwałki and Białystok regions of Poland, as well as adjacent ...
parents and the grandson of Morris Milk, a department store owner who helped to organize the first synagogue in the area. As a child, Harvey was teased for his protruding ears, big nose, and oversized feet, and tended to grab attention as a class clown. While he was in school, he played football and developed a passion for
opera Opera is a form of theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically a collaboration between a composer and a libr ...
. Under his name in the high school yearbook, it read, "Glimpy Milk—and they say WOMEN are never at a loss for words". Milk graduated from
Bay Shore High School Bay Shore High School is a public high school located in Bay Shore, New York. The school serves about 2,000 students in grades 9 to 12.Bay Shore, New York, in 1947 and attended New York State College for Teachers in Albany (now the State University of New York at Albany) from 1947 to 1951, majoring in mathematics. He also wrote for the college newspaper. One classmate remembered, "He was never thought of as a possible queer—that's what you called them then—he was a man's man".


Early career

After graduation, Milk joined the
United States Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage ...
during the
Korean War {{Infobox military conflict , conflict = Korean War , partof = the Cold War and the Korean conflict , image = Korean War Montage 2.png , image_size = 300px , caption = Clockwise from top:{ ...
. He served aboard the
submarine rescue ship A submarine rescue ship is a surface support ship for submarine rescue and deep-sea salvage operations. Methods employed include the McCann Rescue Chamber, deep-submergence rescue vehicles (DSRV's) and diving operations. List of active su ...
as a diving officer. He later transferred to Naval Station, San Diego to serve as a diving instructor. In 1955, he resigned from the Navy at the rank of lieutenant, junior grade, forced to accept an "other than honorable" discharge and leave the service rather than face a court-martial because of his homosexuality.While Milk said numerous times that he was
dishonorably discharged A military discharge is given when a member of the armed forces is released from their obligation to serve. Each country's military has different types of discharge. They are generally based on whether the persons completed their training and the ...
and claimed it was because he was gay, for a number of years this claim was doubted. For example, his biographer Randy Shilts was skeptical of this claim, stating: "The Harvey Milk of this era was no political activist, and according to available evidence, he played the more typical balancing act between discretion and his sex drive." In addition, the Harvey Milk Archives-Scott Smith Collection included a photocopy of what appeared to be Milk's honorable discharge paperwork from the U.S. Navy. However, a records request from the U.S. Navy revealed that he did indeed receive an "other than honorable" discharge and was forced to resign for being gay. It appears Milk forged the discharge papers now in his archives in order to be employed after leaving the service.
Milk's early career was marked by frequent changes; in later years he would take delight in talking about his metamorphosis from a middle-class Jewish boy. He began teaching at
George W. Hewlett High School George W. Hewlett High School (also known as Hewlett High School, or HHS, and replacing Woodmere High School) is a four-year public high school in Hewlett Bay Park, New York, United States. Located in the Five Towns area of Long Island, it is the ...
on
Long Island Long Island is a densely populated island in the southeastern region of the U.S. state of New York, part of the New York metropolitan area. With over 8 million people, Long Island is the most populous island in the United States and the 18 ...
. In 1956, he met Joe Campbell, at the Jacob Riis Park beach, a popular location for gay men in
Queens Queens is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Queens County, in the U.S. state of New York. Located on Long Island, it is the largest New York City borough by area. It is bordered by the borough of Brooklyn at the western tip of Long ...
. Milk pursued Campbell passionately. Even after they moved in together, Milk wrote Campbell romantic notes and poems. Growing bored with their New York lives, they decided to move to
Dallas Dallas () is the third largest city in Texas and the largest city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States at 7.5 million people. It is the largest city in and seat of Dallas County ...
, Texas, but they were unhappy there and moved back to New York, where Milk got a job as an actuarial statistician at an insurance firm."Historical Note"
''The Harvey Milk Papers: Susan Davis Alch Collection (1956–1962)''
(PDF)
San Francisco Public Library
. Retrieved on October 8, 2008.
Campbell and Milk separated after almost six years; it would be his longest relationship. Milk tried to keep his early romantic life separate from his family and work. Once again bored and single in New York, he thought of moving to Miami to marry a lesbian friend to "have a front and each would not be in the way of the other". However, he decided to remain in New York, where he secretly pursued gay relationships. In 1962, Milk became involved with
Craig Rodwell Craig L. Rodwell (October 31, 1940 – June 18, 1993) was an American gay rights activist known for founding the Oscar Wilde Memorial Bookshop on November 24, 1967, the first bookstore devoted to gay and lesbian authors, and as the prime move ...
, who was 10 years younger. Though Milk courted Rodwell ardently, waking him every morning with a call and sending him notes, Milk was uncomfortable with Rodwell's involvement with the New York Mattachine Society, a gay-rights organization. When Rodwell was arrested for walking in Riis Park, and charged with inciting a riot and with indecent exposure (the law required men's swimsuits to extend from above the navel to below the thigh), he spent three days in jail. The relationship soon ended as Milk became alarmed at Rodwell's tendency to agitate the police.In addition to his concerns over Rodwell's activism, Milk believed that Rodwell had given him gonorrhea. (Carter, pp. 31–32.) Milk abruptly stopped working as an insurance actuary and became a researcher at the Wall Street firm Bache & Company. He was frequently promoted despite his tendency to offend the older members of the firm by ignoring their advice and flaunting his success. Although he was skilled at his job, co-workers sensed that Milk's heart was not in his work."Harvey Bernard Milk." ''Dictionary of American Biography'', Supplement 10: 1976–1980. Charles Scribner's Sons, 1995. He started a romantic relationship with Jack Galen McKinley and recruited him to work on conservative Republican Barry Goldwater's 1964 presidential campaign. Their relationship was troubled. When McKinley first began his relationship with Milk in late 1964, McKinley was 16 years old. He was prone to depression and sometimes threatened to commit
suicide Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Mental disorders (including depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, personality disorders, anxiety disorders), physical disorders (such as chronic fatigue syndrome), and ...
if Milk did not show him enough attention. To make a point to McKinley, Milk took him to the hospital where Milk's ex-lover, Joe Campbell, was himself recuperating from a suicide attempt, after his lover Billy Sipple left him. Milk had remained friendly with Campbell, who had entered the
avant-garde The avant-garde (; In 'advance guard' or ' vanguard', literally 'fore-guard') is a person or work that is experimental, radical, or unorthodox with respect to art, culture, or society.John Picchione, The New Avant-garde in Italy: Theoretica ...
art scene in
Greenwich Village Greenwich Village ( , , ) is a neighborhood on the west side of Lower Manhattan in New York City, bounded by 14th Street to the north, Broadway to the east, Houston Street to the south, and the Hudson River to the west. Greenwich Village ...
, but Milk did not understand why Campbell's despondency was sufficient cause to consider suicide as an option.


Castro Street

Since the end of World War II, the major port city of San Francisco had been home to a sizable number of gay men who had been expelled from the military and decided to stay rather than return to their hometowns and face ostracism.D'Emilio, John. "Gay Politics and Community in San Francisco since World War II", in ''Hidden From History: Reclaiming the Gay and Lesbian Past'', New American Library (1989). By 1969 the Kinsey Institute believed San Francisco had more gay people per capita than any other American city; when the National Institute of Mental Health asked the institute to survey homosexuals, the Institute chose San Francisco as its focus. Milk and McKinley were among the thousands of gay men attracted to San Francisco. McKinley was a stage manager for Tom O'Horgan, a director who started his career in experimental theater, but soon graduated to much larger Broadway productions. They arrived in 1969 with the Broadway touring company of '' Hair''. McKinley was offered a job in the New York City production of '' Jesus Christ Superstar'', and their tempestuous relationship came to an end. The city appealed to Milk so much that he decided to stay, working at an investment firm. In 1970, increasingly frustrated with the political climate after the U.S. invasion of Cambodia, Milk let his hair grow long. When told to cut it, he refused and was fired. Milk drifted from California to Texas to New York, without a steady job or plan. In New York City he became involved with O'Horgan's theater company as a "general aide", signing on as associate producer for ''Lenny'' and for Eve Merriam's ''Inner City''.Gruen, John (January 2, 1972)
"Do You Mind Critics Calling You Cheap, Decadent, Sensationalistic, Gimmicky—"
''The New York Times'', p. SM14.
The time he had spent with the cast of flower children wore away much of Milk's conservatism. A contemporary ''New York Times'' story about O'Horgan described Milk as "a sad eyed man—another aging hippie with long, long hair, wearing faded jeans and pretty beads". Craig Rodwell read the description of the formerly uptight man and wondered if it could be the same person.Shilts, p. 44. One of Milk's Wall Street friends worried that he seemed to have no plan or future, but remembered Milk's attitude: "I think he was happier than at any time I had ever seen him in his entire life." Rosa von Praunheim's documentary short film ''Homosexuals in New York'' shows Milk exuberant as a protester on Christopher Street Day 1971 in New York. Milk met Scott Smith, 18 years his junior, and began another relationship. Milk and Smith returned to San Francisco, where they lived on money they had saved. In March 1973, after a roll of film Milk left at a local shop was ruined, he and Smith opened a camera store on Castro Street with their last $1,000.Shilts, p. 65.


Changing politics

In the late 1960s, the
Society for Individual Rights The homophile movement is a collective term for the main organisations and publications supporting and representing sexual minorities in the 1950s to 1960s around the world. The name comes from the term ''homophile'', which was commonly used by the ...
(SIR) and the Daughters of Bilitis (DOB) began to work against police persecution of gay bars and
entrapment Entrapment is a practice in which a law enforcement agent or agent of the state induces a person to commit a "crime" that the person would have otherwise been unlikely or unwilling to commit.''Sloane'' (1990) 49 A Crim R 270. See also agent prov ...
in San Francisco. Oral sex was still a
felony A felony is traditionally considered a crime of high seriousness, whereas a misdemeanor is regarded as less serious. The term "felony" originated from English common law (from the French medieval word "félonie") to describe an offense that res ...
, and in 1970, nearly 90 people in the city were arrested for having sex in public parks at night. Mayor Alioto asked the police to target the parks, hoping the decision would appeal to the Archdiocese and his Catholic supporters. In 1971, 2,800 gay men were arrested for
public sex __NOTOC__ Public sex is sexual activity that takes place in a public context. It refers to one or more persons performing a sex act in a public place, or in a private place that can be viewed from a public place. Such a private place may be a ...
in San Francisco. By comparison, New York City recorded only 63 arrests for the same offense that year. Any arrest for a morals charge required registration as a sex offender.Clendinen, p. 154. Congressman Phillip Burton, Assemblyman Willie Brown, and other California politicians recognized the growing clout and organization of homosexuals in the city, and courted their votes by attending meetings of gay and lesbian organizations. Brown pushed for legalization of sex between consenting adults in 1969 but failed. SIR was also pursued by popular moderate Supervisor
Dianne Feinstein Dianne Goldman Berman Feinstein ( ; born Dianne Emiel Goldman; June 22, 1933) is an American politician who serves as the senior United States senator from California, a seat she has held since 1992. A member of the Democratic Party, she wa ...
in her bid to become mayor, opposing Alioto. Ex-policeman
Richard Hongisto Richard Duane Hongisto (December 16, 1936, Bovey, Minnesota – November 4, 2004, San Francisco, California) was a businessman, politician, sheriff, and police chief of San Francisco, California, and Cleveland, Ohio. Early life and educa ...
worked for 10 years to change the conservative views of the San Francisco Police Department, and also actively appealed to the gay community, which responded by raising significant funds for his campaign for sheriff. Though Feinstein was unsuccessful, Hongisto's win in 1971 showed the political clout of the gay community. SIR had become powerful enough for political maneuvering. In 1971 SIR members Jim Foster, Rick Stokes, and '' Advocate'' publisher
David Goodstein David Louis Goodstein (born April 5, 1939) is an American physicist and educator. From 1988 to 2007 he served as Vice- provost of the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), where he is also a professor of physics and applied physics, as ...
formed the Alice B. Toklas Memorial Democratic Club, known as simply "Alice". Alice befriended liberal politicians to persuade them to sponsor bills, proving successful in 1972 when Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon obtained Feinstein's support for an ordinance outlawing employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. Alice chose Stokes to run for a relatively unimportant seat on the community college board. Though Stokes received 45,000 votes, he was quiet and unassuming, and did not win. Foster, however, shot to national prominence by being the first openly gay man to address a political convention. His speech at the 1972 Democratic National Convention ensured that his voice, according to San Francisco politicians, was the one to be heard when they wanted the opinions, and especially the votes, of the gay community. Milk became more interested in political and civic matters when he was faced with civic problems and policies he disliked. One day in 1973, a state bureaucrat entered Milk's shop Castro Camera and informed him that he owed $100 as a deposit against state sales tax. Milk was incredulous and traded shouts with the man about the rights of business owners; after he complained for weeks at state offices, the deposit was reduced to $30. Milk fumed about government priorities when a teacher came into his store to borrow a projector because the equipment in the schools did not function. Friends also remember around the same time having to restrain him from kicking the television while
Attorney General In most common law jurisdictions, the attorney general or attorney-general (sometimes abbreviated AG or Atty.-Gen) is the main legal advisor to the government. The plural is attorneys general. In some jurisdictions, attorneys general also have exec ...
John N. Mitchell gave consistent "I don't recall" replies during the Watergate hearings. Milk decided that the time had come to run for city supervisor. He said later, "I finally reached the point where I knew I had to become involved or shut up".


Campaigns

Milk received an icy reception from the gay political establishment in San Francisco. Jim Foster, who had by then been active in gay politics for ten years, resented that the newcomer had asked for his endorsement for a position as prestigious as city supervisor. Foster told Milk, "There's an old saying in the Democratic Party. You don't get to dance unless you put up the chairs. I've never seen you put up the chairs." Milk was furious that Foster had snubbed him for the position, and the conversation marked the beginning of an antagonistic relationship between the "Alice" Club and Harvey Milk. Some gay bar owners, still battling police harassment and unhappy with what they saw as a timid approach by Alice to established authority in the city, decided to endorse him. Milk had drifted through life up to this point, but he found his vocation, according to journalist Frances FitzGerald, who called him a "born politician".FitzGerald, Frances (July 21, 1986). "A Reporter at Large: The Castro – I", ''The New Yorker'', p. 34–70. At first, his inexperience showed. He tried to do without money, support, or staff, and instead relied on his message of sound financial management, promoting individuals over large corporations and government. He supported the reorganization of supervisor elections from a citywide ballot to district ballots, which was intended to reduce the influence of money and give neighborhoods more control over their representatives in city government. He also ran on a culturally liberal platform, opposing
government interference Interventionism refers to a political practice of intervention, particularly to the practice of governments to interfere in political affairs of other countries, staging military or trade interventions. Economic interventionism refers to a diffe ...
in private sexual matters and favoring the legalization of marijuana. Milk's fiery, flamboyant speeches and savvy media skills earned him a significant amount of press during the 1973 election. He earned 16,900 votes—sweeping the Castro District and other liberal neighborhoods and coming in 10th place out of 32 candidates. Had the elections been reorganized to allow districts to elect their own supervisors, he would have won.


Mayor of Castro Street

From early in his political career, Milk displayed an affinity for building coalitions. The Teamsters wanted to strike against beer distributors— Coors in particular—who refused to sign the union contract. An organizer asked Milk for assistance with gay bars; in return, Milk asked the union to hire more gay drivers. A few days later, Milk canvassed the gay bars in and surrounding the Castro District, urging them to refuse to sell the beer. With the help of a coalition of Arab and Chinese grocers the Teamsters had also recruited, the boycott was successful. Milk found a strong political ally in
organized labor A trade union (labor union in American English), often simply referred to as a union, is an organization of workers intent on "maintaining or improving the conditions of their employment", ch. I such as attaining better wages and benefits (s ...
, and it was around this time that he began to style himself "The Mayor of Castro Street". As Castro Street's presence grew, so did Milk's reputation. Tom O'Horgan remarked, "Harvey spent most of his life looking for a stage. On Castro Street he finally found it." Tensions were growing between the older citizens of the Most Holy Redeemer Parish and the gays who were entering the Castro District. In 1973, two gay men tried to open an antique shop, but the Eureka Valley Merchants Association (EVMA) attempted to prevent them from receiving a business license. Milk and a few other gay business owners founded the Castro Village Association, with Milk as the president. He often repeated his philosophy that gays should buy from gay businesses. Milk organized the Castro Street Fair in 1974 to attract more customers to the area."Harvey Bernard Milk". ''Encyclopedia of World Biography'', 2nd ed. 17 Vols. Gale Research, 1998. More than 5,000 attended, and some of the EVMA members were stunned; they did more business at the Castro Street Fair than on any previous day.


Serious candidate

Although he was a newcomer to the Castro District, Milk had shown leadership in the small community. He was starting to be taken seriously as a candidate and decided to run again for supervisor in 1975. He reconsidered his approach and cut his long hair, swore off marijuana, and vowed never to visit another gay bathhouse again. Milk's campaigning earned the support of the teamsters, firefighters, and construction unions. His store, Castro Camera became the center of activity in the neighborhood. Milk would often pull people off the street to work his campaigns—many discovered later that they just happened to be the type of men Milk found attractive. Milk favored support for small businesses and the growth of neighborhoods. Since 1968, Mayor Alioto had been luring large corporations to the city despite what critics labeled "the Manhattanization of San Francisco". As blue-collar jobs were replaced by the service industry, Alioto's weakened political base allowed for new leadership to be voted into office in the city. In 1975, state senator George Moscone was elected mayor. Moscone had been instrumental in repealing the sodomy law earlier that year in the California State Legislature. He acknowledged Milk's influence in his election by visiting Milk's election night headquarters, thanking Milk personally, and offering him a position as a city commissioner. Milk came in seventh place in the election, only one position away from earning a supervisor seat. Liberal politicians held the offices of the mayor, district attorney, and sheriff. Despite the new leadership in the city, there were still conservative strongholds. In one of Moscone's first acts as mayor, he appointed a police chief to the embattled San Francisco Police Department (SFPD). He chose Charles Gain, against the wishes of the SFPD. Most of the force disliked Gain for criticizing the police in the press for racial insensitivity and alcohol abuse on the job, instead of working within the command structure to change attitudes.Gain further alienated the SFPD by attending a raucous party in 1977 called the Hooker's Ball. The party grew out of control and Gain had to call in reinforcements to control the excesses, but a photograph ran in the papers of him holding a champagne bottle while standing beside prostitution rights activist Margo St. James and a drag queen named "Wonder Whore". (Weiss, pp. 156–157.) By request of the mayor, Gain made it clear that gay police officers would be welcomed in the department; this became national news. Police under Gain expressed their hatred of him, and of the mayor for betraying them.


Outing of Oliver Sipple

Milk's role as a representative of San Francisco's gay community expanded during this period. On September 22, 1975, President
Gerald Ford Gerald Rudolph Ford Jr. ( ; born Leslie Lynch King Jr.; July 14, 1913December 26, 2006) was an American politician who served as the 38th president of the United States from 1974 to 1977. He was the only president never to have been elected ...
, while visiting San Francisco, walked from his hotel to his car. In the crowd, Sara Jane Moore raised a gun to shoot him. A former
Marine Marine is an adjective meaning of or pertaining to the sea or ocean. Marine or marines may refer to: Ocean * Maritime (disambiguation) * Marine art * Marine biology * Marine debris * Marine habitats * Marine life * Marine pollution Military ...
who had been walking by grabbed her arm as the gun discharged toward the pavement. The bystander was Oliver "Bill" Sipple, who had left Milk's ex-lover Joe Campbell years before, prompting Campbell's suicide attempt. The national spotlight was on him immediately. On psychiatric disability leave from the military, Sipple refused to call himself a hero and did not want his sexuality disclosed."The Man Who Grabbed the Gun"
''Time'' (October 6, 1975). Retrieved September 6, 2008.
Milk, however, took advantage of the opportunity to illustrate his cause that public perception of gay people would be improved if they came out of the closet. He told a friend: "It's too good an opportunity. For once we can show that gays do heroic things, not just all that ca-ca about molesting children and hanging out in bathrooms." Milk contacted a newspaper.Morain, Dan (February 13, 1989). "Sorrow Trailed a Veteran Who Saved a President and Then Was Cast in an Unwanted Spotlight", ''The Los Angeles Times'', p. 1. Several days later
Herb Caen Herbert Eugene Caen (; April 3, 1916 February 1, 1997) was a San Francisco humorist and journalist whose daily column of local goings-on and insider gossip, social and political happenings, and offbeat puns and anecdotes—"A continuous love le ...
, a columnist at ''
The San Francisco Chronicle The ''San Francisco Chronicle'' is a newspaper serving primarily the San Francisco Bay Area of Northern California. It was founded in 1865 as ''The Daily Dramatic Chronicle'' by teenage brothers Charles de Young and Michael H. de Young. The p ...
'', exposed Sipple as gay and a friend of Milk's. The announcement was picked up by national newspapers, and Milk's name was included in many of the stories. ''
Time Time is the continued sequence of existence and event (philosophy), events that occurs in an apparently irreversible process, irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various me ...
'' magazine named Milk as a leader in San Francisco's gay community. Sipple was besieged by reporters, as was his family. His mother, a staunch
Baptist Baptists form a major branch of Protestantism distinguished by baptizing professing Christian believers only ( believer's baptism), and doing so by complete immersion. Baptist churches also generally subscribe to the doctrines of soul c ...
in Detroit, now refused to speak to him. Although he had been involved with the gay community for years, even participating in Gay Pride events, Sipple sued the ''Chronicle'' for invasion of privacy. President Ford sent Sipple a note of thanks for saving his life. Milk said that Sipple's sexual orientation was the reason he received only a note, rather than an invitation to the
White House The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States. It is located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., and has been the residence of every U.S. president since John Adams in ...
.Sipple's case was eventually rejected in 1984 in a California court of appeals. Sipple, who was wounded in the head in Vietnam, was also diagnosed as having paranoid schizophrenia. He held no ill will toward Milk, however, and remained in contact with him. The incident brought him so much attention that, later in life while drinking, he stated that he regretted having grabbed Moore's gun. Eventually Sipple regained contact with his mother and brother, but continued to be rejected by his father. He kept the letter written by Gerald Ford, framed, in his apartment, until he died of pneumonia in 1989. ("Sorrow Trailed a Veteran Who Saved a President's Life", ''The Los Angeles Times'', ebruary 13, 1989 p. 1.)


Race for State Assembly

Keeping his promise to Milk, newly elected Mayor George Moscone appointed him to the Board of Permit Appeals in 1976, making him the first openly gay city commissioner in the United States. Milk considered seeking a position in the
California State Assembly The California State Assembly is the lower house of the California State Legislature, the upper house being the California State Senate. The Assembly convenes, along with the State Senate, at the California State Capitol in Sacramento. The ...
. The district was weighted heavily in his favor, as much of it was based in neighborhoods surrounding Castro Street, where Milk's sympathizers voted. In the previous race for supervisor, Milk received more votes than the currently seated assemblyman. However, Moscone had made a deal with the assembly speaker that another candidate should run— Art Agnos. Furthermore, by order of the mayor, neither appointed nor elected officials were allowed to run a campaign while performing their duties. Milk spent five weeks on the Board of Permit Appeals before Moscone was forced to fire him when he announced he would run for the California State Assembly. Rick Stokes replaced him. Milk's firing, and the backroom deal made between Moscone, the assembly speaker, and Agnos, fueled his campaign as he took on the identity of a political underdog.Shilts, p. 133–137. He railed that high officers in the city and state governments were against him. He complained that the prevailing gay political establishment, particularly the Alice B. Toklas Memorial Democratic Club, were shutting him out; he referred to Jim Foster and Stokes as gay "
Uncle Tom Uncle Tom is the title character of Harriet Beecher Stowe's 1852 novel, '' Uncle Tom's Cabin''. The character was seen by many readers as a ground-breaking humanistic portrayal of a slave, one who uses nonresistance and gives his life to prot ...
s". He enthusiastically embraced a local independent weekly magazine's headline: "Harvey Milk vs. The Machine". The Alice B. Toklas Club made no endorsement in the primary — neither Milk nor Agnos — while other gay-aligned clubs and groups endorsed Agnos or did dual endorsements. Milk's continuing campaign, run from the storefront of Castro Camera, was a study in disorganization. Although the older Irish grandmothers and gay men who volunteered were plentiful and happy to send out mass mailings, Milk's notes and volunteer lists were kept on scrap papers. Any time the campaign required funds, the money came from the cash register without any consideration for accounting. The campaign manager's assistant was an 11-year-old neighborhood girl. Milk himself was hyperactive and prone to fantastic outbursts of temper, only to recover quickly and shout excitedly about something else. Many of his rants were directed at his lover, Scott Smith, who was becoming disillusioned with the man who was no longer the laid-back hippie he had fallen in love with. If the candidate was manic, he was also dedicated and filled with good humor, and he had a particular genius for getting media attention. He spent long hours registering voters and shaking hands at bus stops and movie theater lines. He took whatever opportunity came along to promote himself. He thoroughly enjoyed campaigning, and his success was evident. With the large numbers of volunteers, he had dozens at a time stand along the busy thoroughfare of Market Street as human billboards, holding "Milk for Assembly" signs while commuters drove into the heart of the city to work. He distributed his campaign literature anywhere he could, including one of the most influential political groups in the city, the Peoples Temple. Milk accepted Temple volunteers to work his phones. On February 19, 1978, Milk wrote a letter to President Jimmy Carter defending cult leader Jim Jones as "a man of the highest character" when asked.Milk, Harvey. February 19, 1978.
Letter Addressed to President Jimmy Carter
"
Milk's relationship with the Temple was similar to other politicians' in Northern California. According to ''The San Francisco Examiner'', Jones and his parishioners were a "potent political force", helping to elect Moscone (who appointed him to the Housing Authority), District Attorney Joseph Freitas, and Sheriff Richard Hongisto. When Milk learned Jones was backing both him and Art Agnos in 1976, he told friend Michael Wong, "Well fuck him. I'll take his workers, but, that's the game Jim Jones plays." But to his volunteers, he said: "Make sure you're always nice to the Peoples Temple. If they ask you to do something, do it, and then send them a note thanking them for asking you to do it." The race was close, and Milk lost by fewer than 4,000 votes. Agnos taught Milk a valuable lesson when he criticized Milk's campaign speeches as "a downer ... You talk about how you're gonna throw the bums out, but how are you gonna fix things—other than beat me? You shouldn't leave your audience on a down." In the wake of his loss, Milk, realizing that the Toklas Club would never support him politically, co-founded the San Francisco Gay Democratic Club.


Broader historical forces

The fledgling gay rights movement had yet to meet organized opposition in the U.S. In 1977 a few well-connected gay activists in Miami, Florida, were able to pass a civil rights ordinance that made discrimination based on sexual orientation illegal in Dade County. A well-organized group of conservative fundamentalist Christians responded, headed by singer Anita Bryant. Their campaign was titled
Save Our Children Save Our Children, Inc. was an American political coalition formed in 1977 in Miami, Florida, to overturn a recently legislated county ordinance that banned discrimination in areas of housing, employment, and public accommodation based on sexua ...
, and Bryant claimed the ordinance infringed her right to teach her children Biblical morality.Fetner, Tina (August 2001). "Working Anita Bryant: The Impact of Christian Anti-Gay Activism on Lesbian and Gay Movement Claims", ''Social Problems'', 48 (3), p. 411–428. Bryant and the campaign gathered 64,000 signatures to put the issue to a county-wide vote. With funds raised in part by the Florida Citrus Commission, for which Bryant was the spokeswoman, they ran television advertisements that contrasted the
Orange Bowl Parade The Orange Bowl is an annual American college football bowl game played in the Miami metropolitan area. It has been played annually since January 1, 1935, making it, along with the Sugar Bowl and the Sun Bowl, the second-oldest bowl game in t ...
with San Francisco's Gay Freedom Day Parade, stating that Dade County would be turned into a "hotbed of homosexuality" where "men ... cavort with little boys".Bryant agreed to an interview with ''
Playboy ''Playboy'' is an American men's Lifestyle magazine, lifestyle and entertainment magazine, formerly in print and currently online. It was founded in Chicago in 1953, by Hugh Hefner and his associates, and funded in part by a $1,000 loan from H ...
'' magazine, in which she was quoted saying that the civil rights ordinance "would have made it mandatory that flaunting homosexuals be hired in both the public and parochial schools ... If they're a legitimate minority, then so are nail biters, dieters, fat people, short people, and murderers." ("Playboy Interview: Anita Bryant", ''Playboy'', (May 1978), p. 73–96, 232–250.) Bryant would often break into her standard " The Battle Hymn of the Republic" while speaking during the campaign, called homosexuals "human garbage", and blamed the drought in California on their sins. (Clendinen, p. 306.) As the special election drew near, a Florida state senator read the
Book of Leviticus The book of Leviticus (, from grc, Λευιτικόν, ; he, וַיִּקְרָא, , "And He called") is the third book of the Torah (the Pentateuch) and of the Old Testament, also known as the Third Book of Moses. Scholars generally agree ...
aloud to the senate, and the governor went on record against the civil rights ordinance. (Duberman, p. 320.)
Jim Foster, then the most powerful political organizer in San Francisco, went to Miami to assist gay activists there as election day neared, and a nationwide
boycott A boycott is an act of nonviolent, voluntary abstention from a product, person, organization, or country as an expression of protest. It is usually for moral, social, political, or environmental reasons. The purpose of a boycott is to inflict so ...
of orange juice was organized. The message of the Save Our Children campaign was influential, and the result was an overwhelming defeat for gay activists; in the largest turnout in any special election in the history of Dade County, 70% voted to repeal the law.


Just politics

Christian conservatives were inspired by their victory, and saw an opportunity for a new, effective political cause. Gay activists were shocked to see how little support they received. An impromptu demonstration of over 3,000 Castro residents formed the night of the Dade County ordinance vote. Gay men and lesbians were simultaneously angry, chanting "Out of the bars and into the streets!", and elated at their passionate and powerful response. ''The San Francisco Examiner'' reported that members of the crowd pulled others out of bars along Castro and Polk Streets to "deafening" cheers. Milk led marchers that night on a five-mile (8 km) course through the city, constantly moving, aware that if they stopped for too long there would be a riot. He declared, "This is the power of the gay community. Anita's going to create a national gay force."Sharpe, Ivan (June 8, 1977). "Angry Gays March Through S.F.", ''The San Francisco Examiner'', p. 1. Activists had little time to recover, however, as the scenario replayed itself when civil rights ordinances were overturned by voters in
Saint Paul, Minnesota Saint Paul (abbreviated St. Paul) is the capital of the U.S. state of Minnesota and the county seat of Ramsey County. Situated on high bluffs overlooking a bend in the Mississippi River, Saint Paul is a regional business hub and the center ...
; Wichita, Kansas; and
Eugene, Oregon Eugene ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Oregon. It is located at the southern end of the Willamette Valley, near the confluence of the McKenzie and Willamette rivers, about east of the Oregon Coast. As of the 2020 United States Census, ...
, throughout 1977 and into 1978. California State Senator John Briggs saw an opportunity in the Christian fundamentalists' campaign. He was hoping to be elected governor of California in 1978, and was impressed with the voter turnout he saw in Miami. When Briggs returned to
Sacramento ) , image_map = Sacramento County California Incorporated and Unincorporated areas Sacramento Highlighted.svg , mapsize = 250x200px , map_caption = Location within Sacramento ...
, he wrote a bill that would ban gays and lesbians from teaching in public schools throughout California. Briggs claimed in private that he had nothing against gays, telling gay journalist Randy Shilts, "It's politics. Just politics." Random attacks on gays rose in the Castro. When the police response was considered inadequate, groups of gays patrolled the neighborhood themselves, on alert for attackers.Hinckle, p. 15. On June 21, 1977, a gay man named Robert Hillsborough died from 15 stab wounds while his attackers gathered around him and chanted "Faggot!" Both Mayor Moscone and Hillsborough's mother blamed Anita Bryant and John Briggs. One week prior to the incident, Briggs had held a press conference at San Francisco City Hall where he called the city a "sexual garbage heap" because of homosexuals. Weeks later, 250,000 people attended the 1977 San Francisco Gay Freedom Day Parade, the largest attendance at any Gay Pride event to that point. In November 1976, voters in San Francisco decided to reorganize supervisor elections to choose supervisors from neighborhoods instead of voting for them in citywide ballots. Harvey Milk quickly qualified as the leading candidate in District 5, surrounding Castro Street.


Last campaign

Anita Bryant's public campaign opposing homosexuality and the multiple challenges to gay rights ordinances across the United States fueled gay politics in San Francisco. Seventeen candidates from the Castro District entered the next race for supervisor; more than half of them were gay. ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' ran an exposé on the veritable invasion of gay people into San Francisco, estimating that the city's gay population was between 100,000 and 200,000 out of a total 750,000.Gold, Herbert (November 6, 1977)
"A Walk on San Francisco's Gay Side"
''The New York Times'', p. SM17.
The Castro Village Association had grown to 90 businesses; the local bank, formerly the smallest branch in the city, had become the largest and was forced to build a wing to accommodate its new customers. Milk biographer Randy Shilts noted that "broader historical forces" were fueling his campaign. Milk's most successful opponent was the quiet and thoughtful lawyer Rick Stokes, who was backed by the Alice B. Toklas Memorial Democratic Club. Stokes had been open about his homosexuality long before Milk had, and had experienced more severe treatment, once hospitalized and forced to endure electroshock therapy to 'cure' him. Milk, however, was more expressive about the role of gay people and their issues in San Francisco politics. Stokes was quoted saying, "I'm just a businessman who happens to be gay," and expressed the view that any normal person could also be homosexual. Milk's contrasting populist philosophy was relayed to ''The New York Times'': "We don't want sympathetic liberals, we want gays to represent gays ... I represent the gay street people—the 14-year-old runaway from
San Antonio ("Cradle of Freedom") , image_map = , mapsize = 220px , map_caption = Interactive map of San Antonio , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = United States , subdivision_type1= State , subdivision_name1 = Texas , subdivision_ ...
. We have to make up for hundreds of years of persecution. We have to give hope to that poor runaway kid from San Antonio. They go to the bars because churches are hostile. They need hope! They need a piece of the pie!" Other causes were also important to Milk: he promoted larger and less expensive child care facilities, free public transportation, and the development of a board of civilians to oversee the police. He advanced important neighborhood issues at every opportunity. Milk used the same manic campaign tactics as in previous races: human billboards, hours of handshaking, and dozens of speeches calling on gay people to have hope. This time, even ''The San Francisco Chronicle'' endorsed him for supervisor. On election day, November 8, 1977, he won by 30% against sixteen other candidates, and after his victory became apparent, he arrived on Castro Street on the back of his campaign manager's motorcycle—escorted by Sheriff
Richard Hongisto Richard Duane Hongisto (December 16, 1936, Bovey, Minnesota – November 4, 2004, San Francisco, California) was a businessman, politician, sheriff, and police chief of San Francisco, California, and Cleveland, Ohio. Early life and educa ...
—to what a newspaper story described as a "tumultuous and moving welcome". Milk had recently taken a new lover, a young man named Jack Lira, who was frequently drunk in public, and just as often escorted out of political events by Milk's aides. Since the race for the California State Assembly, Milk had been receiving increasingly violent death threats. Concerned that his raised profile marked him as a target for assassination, he recorded on tape his thoughts, and whom he wanted to succeed him if he were killed, adding: "If a bullet should enter my brain, let that bullet destroy every closet door".


Supervisor

Milk's swearing-in made national headlines, as he became the first non-incumbent openly gay man in the United States to win an election for public office.Cone, Russ (January 8, 1978). "Feinstein Board President", ''The San Francisco Examiner'', p. 1.Two gay politicians were already in office: lesbian Massachusetts State Representative
Elaine Noble Elaine Noble (born January 22, 1944) is an American politician and LGBT activist who served in the Massachusetts House of Representatives for two terms starting in January 1975. She was the first openly lesbian or gay candidate elected to a state ...
and Minnesota State Senator
Allan Spear Allan Henry Spear (June 24, 1937 – October 11, 2008) was an American politician and educator from Minnesota who served almost thirty years in the Minnesota Senate, including nearly a decade as President of the Senate. Biography Spear was born ...
, who had come out after he had been elected and won re-election.
He likened himself to pioneering African American baseball player
Jackie Robinson Jack Roosevelt Robinson (January 31, 1919 – October 24, 1972) was an American professional baseball player who became the first African American to play in Major League Baseball (MLB) in the modern era. Robinson broke the baseball color line ...
and walked to City Hall arm in arm with Jack Lira, stating "You can stand around and throw bricks at Silly Hall or you can take it over. Well, here we are." The Castro District was not the only neighborhood to promote someone new to city politics. Sworn in with Milk were also a single mother (
Carol Ruth Silver Carol Ruth Silver (born October 1, 1938)Schultz, Debra L. and Blanche Wiesen Cook (2002). ''Going South: Jewish Women in the Civil Rights Movement''. NYU Press, is an American lawyer and civil rights activist. She was a Freedom Rider, arrest ...
), a Chinese American (
Gordon Lau Gordon J. Lau (, August 22, 1941 – April 20, 1998) was the first Chinese American elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in San Francisco, California. He was elected to the city board of supervisors under Mayor George Moscone in 19 ...
), and an African American woman (
Ella Hill Hutch Ella Hill Hutch (June 9, 1923 – February 25, 1981) was an American politician. She was elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in San Francisco, California, in 1977 (along with Harvey Milk and Dan White) and reelected in 1980. She was ...
)—all firsts for the city. Daniel White, a former police officer and firefighter, was also a first-time supervisor, and he spoke of how proud he was that his grandmother was able to see him sworn in.Ledbetter, Les (January 12, 1978)
"San Francisco Legislators Meet in Diversity"
''The New York Times'', Vol. 127, no. 43818. p. A14.
Milk's energy, affinity for pranking, and unpredictability at times exasperated Board of Supervisors President Dianne Feinstein. In his first meeting with Mayor Moscone, Milk called himself the "number one queen" and dictated to Moscone that he would have to go through Milk instead of the Alice B. Toklas Memorial Democratic Club if he wanted the city's gay votes—a quarter of San Francisco's voting population. Milk also became Moscone's closest ally on the Board of Supervisors. The biggest targets of Milk's ire were large corporations and real estate developers. He fumed when a parking garage was slated to take the place of homes near the downtown area, and tried to pass a commuter tax so office workers who lived outside the city and drove into work would have to pay for city services they used. Milk was often willing to vote against Feinstein and other more tenured members of the board. In one controversy early in his term, Milk agreed with fellow Supervisor Dan White, whose district was located two miles south of the Castro, that a mental health facility for troubled adolescents should not be placed there. After Milk learned more about the facility, he decided to switch his vote, ensuring White's loss on the issue—a particularly poignant cause that White championed while campaigning. White did not forget it. He opposed every initiative and issue Milk supported. Milk began his tenure by sponsoring a civil rights bill that outlawed discrimination based on sexual orientation. The ordinance was called the "most stringent and encompassing in the nation", and its passing demonstrated "the growing political power of homosexuals", according to ''The New York Times''. Only Supervisor White voted against it; Mayor Moscone enthusiastically signed it into law with a light blue pen that Milk had given him for the occasion. Another bill Milk concentrated on was designed to solve the number one problem according to a recent citywide poll: dog excrement. Within a month of being sworn in, he began to work on a city ordinance to require dog owners to scoop their pets' feces. Dubbed the "pooper scooper law", its authorization by the Board of Supervisors was covered extensively by television and newspapers in San Francisco. Anne Kronenberg, Milk's campaign manager, called him "a master at figuring out what would get him covered in the newspaper".''The Times of Harvey Milk''. Dir. Rob Epstein. DVD, Pacific Arts, 1984. He invited the press to Duboce Park to explain why it was necessary, and while cameras were rolling, stepped in the offending substance, seemingly by mistake. His staffers knew he had been at the park for an hour before the press conference looking for the right place to walk in front of the cameras. It earned him the most fan mail of his tenure in politics and went out on national news releases. Milk had grown tired of Lira's drinking and considered breaking up with him when Lira called a few weeks later and demanded Milk come home. When Milk arrived, he found Lira had hanged himself. Already prone to severe depression, Lira had attempted suicide previously. One of the notes he left for Milk indicated he was upset about the Anita Bryant and John Briggs campaigns.


Briggs Initiative

John Briggs was forced to drop out of the 1978 race for California governor, but received enthusiastic support for Proposition 6, dubbed the
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 legislato ...
. The proposed law would have made firing gay teachers—and any public school employees who supported gay rights—mandatory. Briggs' messages supporting Proposition 6 were pervasive throughout California, and Harvey Milk attended every event Briggs hosted. Milk campaigned against the bill throughout the state as well,VanDeCarr, Paul (November 23, 2003). "Death of dreams: in November 1978, Harvey Milk's murder and the mass suicides at Jonestown nearly broke San Francisco's spirit.", ''The Advocate'', p. 32. and swore that even if Briggs won California, he would not win San Francisco. In their numerous debates, which toward the end had been honed to quick back-and-forth banter, Briggs maintained that homosexual teachers wanted to abuse and recruit children. Milk responded with statistics compiled by law enforcement that provided evidence that
pedophile Pedophilia ( alternatively spelt paedophilia) is a psychiatric disorder in which an adult or older adolescent experiences a primary or exclusive sexual attraction to prepubescent children. Although girls typically begin the process of pubert ...
s identified primarily as heterosexual, and dismissed Briggs' assertions with one-liner jokes: "If it were true that children mimicked their teachers, you'd sure have a helluva lot more nuns running around." Attendance at Gay Pride marches during the summer of 1978 in Los Angeles and San Francisco swelled. An estimated 250,000 to 375,000 attended San Francisco's Gay Freedom Day Parade; newspapers claimed the higher numbers were due to John Briggs. Organizers asked participants to carry signs indicating their hometowns for the cameras, to show how far people came to live in the Castro District. Milk rode in an open car carrying a sign saying "I'm from Woodmere, N.Y." He gave a version of what became his most famous speech, the "Hope Speech", that ''The San Francisco Examiner'' said "ignited the crowd":Jacobs, John (June 26, 1978). "An Ecumenical Alliance on the Serious Side of 'Gay' ", ''The San Francisco Examiner'', p. 3.
On this anniversary of Stonewall, I ask my gay sisters and brothers to make the commitment to fight. For themselves, for their freedom, for their country ... We will not win our rights by staying quietly in our closets ... We are coming out to fight the lies, the myths, the distortions. We are coming out to tell the truths about gays, for I am tired of the conspiracy of silence, so I'm going to talk about it. And I want you to talk about it. You must come out. Come out to your parents, your relatives.
Despite the losses in battles for gay rights across the country that year, he remained optimistic, saying "Even if gays lose in these initiatives, people are still being educated. Because of Anita Bryant and Dade County, the entire country was educated about homosexuality to a greater extent than ever before. The first step is always hostility, and after that you can sit down and talk about it."Giteck, Lenny (November 28, 1978). "Milk Knew He Would Be Assassinated", ''The San Francisco Examiner'', p. 2. Citing the potential infringements on individual rights, former governor of California
Ronald Reagan Ronald Wilson Reagan ( ; February 6, 1911June 5, 2004) was an American politician, actor, and union leader who served as the 40th president of the United States from 1981 to 1989. He also served as the 33rd governor of California from 1967 ...
voiced his opposition to the proposition, as did Governor
Jerry Brown Edmund Gerald Brown Jr. (born April 7, 1938) is an American lawyer, author, and politician who served as the 34th and 39th governor of California from 1975 to 1983 and 2011 to 2019. A member of the Democratic Party, he was elected Secretary of S ...
and President
Jimmy Carter James Earl Carter Jr. (born October 1, 1924) is an American politician who served as the 39th president of the United States from 1977 to 1981. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he previously served as th ...
, the latter in an afterthought following a speech he gave in Sacramento.Clendinen, pp. 388–389. On November 7, 1978, the proposition lost by more than a million votes, astounding gay activists on election night. In San Francisco, 75 percent voted against it.


Assassination

On November 10, 1978 (10 months after he was sworn in), Dan White resigned his position on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, saying that his annual salary of $9,600 was not enough to support his family."Mayor Hunts a Successor for White", ''The San Francisco Examiner'', (November 11, 1978), p. 1.Despite White's financial strain, he had recently voted against a pay raise for city supervisors that would have given him a $24,000 annual salary. (Cone, Russ ovember 14, 1978 "Increase in City Supervisors' Pay Is Proposed Again", ''The San Francisco Examiner'', p. 4.) Feinstein pointed him toward commercial developers at Pier 39 near Fisherman's Wharf where he and his wife set up a walk-up restaurant called The Hot Potato. (Weiss, p. 143–146.)
Gentrification Gentrification is the process of changing the character of a neighborhood through the influx of more affluent residents and businesses. It is a common and controversial topic in urban politics and planning. Gentrification often increases the ...
in the Castro District was fully apparent in the late 1970s. In Milk's public rants about "bloodsucking" real estate developers, he used his landlord (who was gay) as an example. Not amused, his landlord tripled the rent for the storefront and the apartment above, where Milk lived. (Shilts, p. 227–228.)
Within days, White requested that his resignation be withdrawn and he be reinstated, and Mayor Moscone initially agreed.Ledbetter, Les (November 29, 1978)
"2 Deaths Mourned by San Franciscans"
''The New York Times'', Vol. 128, no. 44051. p. 1.
However, further consideration—and intervention by other supervisors—convinced Moscone to appoint someone more in line with the growing ethnic diversity of White's district and the liberal leanings of the Board of Supervisors.
''Time'', December 11, 1978. Retrieved on September 6, 2008.
On November 18 and 19, news broke of the mass suicide of 900 members of the Peoples Temple. The cult had relocated from San Francisco to
Guyana Guyana ( or ), officially the Cooperative Republic of Guyana, is a country on the northern mainland of South America. Guyana is an indigenous word which means "Land of Many Waters". The capital city is Georgetown. Guyana is bordered by the ...
. California Representative
Leo Ryan Leo Joseph Ryan Jr. (May 5, 1925 – November 18, 1978) was an American teacher and politician. A member of the Democratic Party, he served as the U.S. representative from California's 11th congressional district from 1973 until his assassinati ...
was in Jonestown to check on the remote community, and he was killed by gunfire at an airstrip as he tried to escape the tense situation. Dan White remarked to two aides who were working for his reinstatement, "You see that? One day I'm on the front page and the next I'm swept right off." Moscone planned to announce White's replacement on November 27, 1978.Flintwick, James (November 28, 1978). "Aide: White 'A Wild Man'", ''The San Francisco Examiner'', p. 1. A half hour before the press conference, White avoided metal detectors by entering City Hall through a basement window and went to Moscone's office, where witnesses heard shouting followed by gunshots. White shot Moscone in the shoulder and chest, then twice in the head.Turner, Wallace (November 28, 1978)
"Suspect Sought Job"
''The New York Times'', Vol. 128, no. 44050. p. 1.
White then quickly walked to his former office, reloading his police-issue revolver with hollow-point bullets along the way, and intercepted Milk, asking him to step inside for a moment.
Dianne Feinstein Dianne Goldman Berman Feinstein ( ; born Dianne Emiel Goldman; June 22, 1933) is an American politician who serves as the senior United States senator from California, a seat she has held since 1992. A member of the Democratic Party, she wa ...
heard gunshots and called police, then found Milk face down on the floor, shot five times, including twice in the head.Though Feinstein was known to carry a handgun in her purse, she afterwards became a proponent of gun control. In 1994, Feinstein exchanged words with
National Rifle Association The National Rifle Association of America (NRA) is a gun rights advocacy group based in the United States. Founded in 1871 to advance rifle marksmanship, the modern NRA has become a prominent gun rights lobbying organization while cont ...
member and
Idaho Idaho ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. To the north, it shares a small portion of the Canada–United States border with the province of British Columbia. It borders the states of Monta ...
senator Larry Craig, who suggested during a debate on banning
assault weapons In the United States, ''assault weapon'' is a controversial term used to define firearms with specified characteristics. The definition varies among regulating jurisdictions, but usually includes semi-automatic firearms with a detachable magaz ...
that "the gentlelady from California" should be "a little bit more familiar with firearms and their deadly characteristics." She reminded Craig that she indeed had experience with the results of firearms when she put her finger in a bullet hole in Milk's neck while searching for a pulse. (Faye, Fiore pril 24, 1995 "Rematch on Weapons Ban Takes Shape in Congress Arms: Feinstein prepares to defend the prohibition on assault guns as GOP musters forces to repeal it", ''The Los Angeles Times'', p. 3.)
Soon after, she announced to the press, "Today San Francisco has experienced a double tragedy of immense proportions. As President of the Board of Supervisors, it is my duty to inform you that both Mayor Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk have been shot and killed, and the suspect is Supervisor Dan White." Milk was 48 years old. Moscone was 49. Within an hour, White called his wife from a nearby diner; she met him at a church and was with him when he turned himself in. Many people left flowers on the steps of City Hall, and that evening 25,000 to 40,000 formed a spontaneous candlelight march from Castro Street to City Hall. The next day, the bodies of Moscone and Milk were brought to the City Hall rotunda where mourners paid their respects. Six thousand mourners attended a service for Mayor Moscone at St. Mary's Cathedral. Two memorials were held for Milk; a small one at Temple Emanu-El and a more boisterous one at the
Opera House An opera house is a theatre building used for performances of opera. It usually includes a stage, an orchestra pit, audience seating, and backstage facilities for costumes and building sets. While some venues are constructed specifically fo ...
.


"City in agony"

In the wake of the Jonestown suicides, Moscone had recently increased security at City Hall. Cult survivors recounted drills for suicide preparations that Jones had called "White Nights". Rumors about the murders of Moscone and Milk were fueled by the coincidence of Dan White's name and Jones's suicide preparations. A stunned District Attorney called the assassinations so close to the news about Jonestown "incomprehensible", but denied any connection. Governor
Jerry Brown Edmund Gerald Brown Jr. (born April 7, 1938) is an American lawyer, author, and politician who served as the 34th and 39th governor of California from 1975 to 1983 and 2011 to 2019. A member of the Democratic Party, he was elected Secretary of S ...
ordered all flags in California to be flown at
half staff Half-mast or half-staff (American English) refers to a flag flying below the summit of a ship mast, a pole on land, or a pole on a building. In many countries this is seen as a symbol of respect, mourning, distress, or, in some cases, a salu ...
, and called Milk a "hard-working and dedicated supervisor, a leader of San Francisco's gay community, who kept his promise to represent all his constituents"."Reaction: World Coming Apart", ''The San Francisco Examiner'', (November 28, 1978), p. 2. President
Jimmy Carter James Earl Carter Jr. (born October 1, 1924) is an American politician who served as the 39th president of the United States from 1977 to 1981. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he previously served as th ...
expressed his shock at both murders and sent his condolences. Speaker of the California Assembly Leo McCarthy called it "an insane tragedy". "A City in Agony" topped the headlines in ''The San Francisco Examiner'' the day after the murders; inside the paper stories of the assassinations under the headline "Black Monday" were printed back to back with updates of bodies being shipped home from Guyana. An editorial describing "A city with more sadness and despair in its heart than any city should have to bear" went on to ask how such tragedies could occur, particularly to "men of such warmth and vision and great energies". Dan White was charged with two counts of murder and held without bail, eligible for the death penalty owing to the recent passage of a statewide proposition that allowed death or life in prison for the murder of a public official. One analysis of the months surrounding the murders called 1978 and 1979 "the most emotionally devastating years in San Francisco's fabulously spotted history". The 32-year-old White, who had been in the Army during the
Vietnam War The Vietnam War (also known by #Names, other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vie ...
, had run on a tough anti-crime platform in his district. Colleagues declared him a high-achieving "all-American boy". He was to have received an award the next week for rescuing a woman and child from a 17-story burning building when he was a firefighter in 1977. Though he was the only supervisor to vote against Milk's gay rights ordinance earlier that year, he had been quoted as saying, "I respect the rights of all people, including gays". Milk and White at first got along well. One of White's political aides (who was gay) remembered, "Dan had more in common with Harvey than he did with anyone else on the board".Geluardi, John (January 30, 2008)
"Dan White's Motive More About Betrayal Than Homophobia"
, ''SF Weekly''. Retrieved September 11, 2008.
White had voted to support a center for gay seniors, and to honor Phyllis Lyon and Del Martin's 25th anniversary and pioneering work. After Milk's vote for the mental health facility in White's district, however, White refused to speak with Milk and communicated with only one of Milk's aides. Other acquaintances remembered White as very intense. "He was impulsive ... He was an extremely competitive man, obsessively so ... I think he could not take defeat," San Francisco's assistant fire chief told reporters.Carlsen, William (November 29, 1978)
"Ex-aide Held in Moscone Killing Ran as a Crusader Against Crime"
''The New York Times'', Vol. 128, no. 44051. p. A22.
White's first campaign manager quit in the middle of the campaign, and told a reporter that White was an egotist and it was clear that he was antigay, though he denied it in the press.Hinckle, p. 30. White's associates and supporters described him "as a man with a pugilistic temper and an impressive capacity for nurturing a grudge". The aide who had handled communications between White and Milk remembered, "Talking to him, I realized that he saw Harvey Milk and George Moscone as representing all that was wrong with the world". When Milk's friends looked in his closet for a suit for his casket, they learned how much he had been affected by the recent decrease in his income as a supervisor. All of his clothes were coming apart and all of his socks had holes. His remains were cremated and his ashes were split. His closest friends scattered most of the ashes in
San Francisco Bay San Francisco Bay is a large tidal estuary in the U.S. state of California, and gives its name to the San Francisco Bay Area. It is dominated by the big cities of San Francisco, San Jose, and Oakland. San Francisco Bay drains water f ...
. Other ashes were encapsulated and buried beneath the sidewalk in front of 575 Castro Street, where Castro Camera had been located. There is a memorial to Milk at the Neptune Society Columbarium, ground floor, San Francisco, California. Harry Britt, one of four people Milk listed on his tape as an acceptable replacement should he be assassinated, was chosen to fill that position by the city's acting mayor, Dianne Feinstein.


Trial and conviction

Dan White's arrest and trial caused a sensation and illustrated severe tensions between the liberal population and the city police. The San Francisco Police were mostly working-class Irish descendants who intensely disliked the growing gay immigration as well as the liberal direction of the city government. After White turned himself in and confessed, he sat in his cell while his former colleagues on the police force told Harvey Milk jokes; police openly wore "Free Dan White" T-shirts in the days after the murder. An undersheriff for San Francisco later stated: "The more I observed what went on at the jail, the more I began to stop seeing what Dan White did as the act of an individual and began to see it as a political act in a political movement." White showed no remorse for his actions, and exhibited vulnerability only during an eight-minute call to his mother from jail. The jury for White's trial consisted of white middle-class San Franciscans who were mostly Catholic; gays and ethnic minorities were excused from the jury pool. Some of the members of the jury cried when they heard White's tearful recorded confession, at the end of which the interrogator thanked White for his honesty.Hinckle, p. 49. White's defense attorney, Doug Schmidt, argued that his client was not responsible for his actions; Schmidt used the legal defense known as diminished capacity: "Good people, fine people, with fine backgrounds, simply don't kill people in cold blood." Schmidt tried to prove that White's anguished mental state was a result of manipulation by the politicos in City Hall who had consistently disappointed and confounded him, finally promising to give his job back only to refuse him again. Schmidt said that White's mental deterioration was demonstrated and exacerbated by his junk food binge the night before the murders, since he was usually known to have been health-food conscious.Mounts, Suzanne (Spring 1999). "Malice Aforethought in California: A History of Legislative Abdication and Judicial Vacillation", ''University of San Francisco Law Review'' (33 U.S.F. L. Rev. 313). Area newspapers quickly dubbed it the
Twinkie defense "Twinkie defense" is a derisive label for an improbable legal defense. It is not a recognized legal defense in jurisprudence, but a catch-all term coined by reporters during their coverage of the trial of defendant Dan White for the murders of S ...
. White was acquitted of the first degree murder charge on May 21, 1979, but found guilty of voluntary manslaughter of both victims, and he was sentenced to serve seven and two-thirds years. With the sentence reduced for time served and good behavior, he would be released in five.Weiss, p. 436. He cried when he heard the verdict.


White Night riots

Acting Mayor Feinstein, Supervisor Carol Ruth Silver, and Milk's successor Harry Britt condemned the jury's decision. When the verdict was announced over the police radio, someone sang " Danny Boy" on the police band. A surge of people from the Castro District walked again to City Hall, chanting "Avenge Harvey Milk" and "He got away with murder". Pandemonium rapidly escalated as rocks were hurled at the front doors of the building. Milk's friends and aides tried to stop the destruction, but the mob of more than 3,000 ignored them and lit police cars on fire. They shoved a burning newspaper dispenser through the broken doors of City Hall, then cheered as the flames grew. One of the rioters responded to a reporter's question about why they were destroying parts of the city: "Just tell people that we ate too many Twinkies. That's why this is happening." The chief of police ordered the police not to retaliate, but to hold their ground. The
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 Super ...
, as they became known, lasted several hours. Later that evening, several police cruisers filled with officers wearing riot gear arrived at the Elephant Walk Bar on Castro Street. Harvey Milk's protégé
Cleve Jones Cleve Jones (born October 11, 1954) is an American AIDS and LGBT rights activist. He conceived the NAMES Project AIDS Memorial Quilt, which has become, at 54 tons, the world's largest piece of community folk art as of 2020. In 1983, at the onset ...
and a reporter for the ''San Francisco Chronicle'', Warren Hinckle, watched as officers stormed into the bar and began to beat patrons at random. After a 15-minute melee, they left the bar and struck out at people walking along the street. After the verdict, District Attorney Joseph Freitas faced a furious gay community to explain what had gone wrong. The prosecutor admitted to feeling sorry for White before the trial, and neglected to ask the interrogator who had recorded White's confession (and who was a childhood friend of White's and his police softball team coach) about his biases and the support White received from the police because, he said, he did not want to embarrass the detective in front of his family in court. Nor did Freitas question White's frame of mind or lack of a history of mental illness, or bring into evidence city politics, suggesting that revenge may have been a motive. Supervisor Carol Ruth Silver testified on the last day of the trial that White and Milk were not friendly, yet she had contacted the prosecutor and insisted on testifying. It was the only testimony the jury heard about their strained relationship. Freitas blamed the jury who he claimed had been "taken in by the whole emotional aspect of hetrial".


Aftermath

The murders of Milk and Moscone and White's trial changed city politics and the California legal system. In 1980, San Francisco ended district supervisor elections, fearing that a Board of Supervisors so divisive would be harmful to the city and that they had been a factor in the assassinations. A grassroots neighborhood effort to restore district elections in the mid-1990s proved successful, and the city returned to neighborhood representatives in 2000. As a result of Dan White's trial, California voters changed the law to reduce the likelihood of acquittals of accused who knew what they were doing but claimed their capacity was impaired. Diminished capacity was abolished as a defense to a charge, but courts allowed evidence of it when deciding whether to incarcerate, commit, or otherwise punish a convicted defendant. The "Twinkie defense" has entered American mythology, popularly described as a case where a murderer escapes justice because he binged on junk food, simplifying White's lack of political savvy, his relationships with George Moscone and Harvey Milk, and what ''San Francisco Chronicle'' columnist
Herb Caen Herbert Eugene Caen (; April 3, 1916 February 1, 1997) was a San Francisco humorist and journalist whose daily column of local goings-on and insider gossip, social and political happenings, and offbeat puns and anecdotes—"A continuous love le ...
described as his "dislike of homosexuals". Dan White served just over five years for the double homicide of Moscone and Milk; he was released from prison on January 7, 1984. On October 21, 1985, White was found dead in a running car in his ex-wife's garage, having committed suicide by
carbon monoxide Carbon monoxide ( chemical formula CO) is a colorless, poisonous, odorless, tasteless, flammable gas that is slightly less dense than air. Carbon monoxide consists of one carbon atom and one oxygen atom connected by a triple bond. It is the simpl ...
poisoning. He was 39 years old. His defense attorney told reporters that he had been despondent over the loss of his family and the situation he had caused, adding, "This was a sick man."Lindsey, Robert (October 22, 1985)
"Dan White, Killer of San Francisco Mayor, a suicide"
''The New York Times'', Vol. 135, no. 46570. p. A18.


Legacy

Milk's political career centered on making government responsive to individuals, gay liberation, and the importance of neighborhoods to the city. At the onset of each campaign, an issue was added to Milk's public political philosophy.Foss, Karen (1988). "You Have to Give Them Hope", ''Journal of the West'', 27 pp. 75–81. His 1973 campaign focused on the first point, that as a small business owner in San Francisco—a city dominated by large corporations that had been courted by municipal government—his interests were being overlooked because he was not represented by a large financial institution. Although he did not hide the fact that he was gay, it did not become an issue until his race for the California State Assembly in 1976. It was brought to the fore in the supervisor race against Rick Stokes, as it was an extension of his ideas of individual freedom. Milk strongly believed that neighborhoods promoted unity and a small-town experience, and that the Castro should provide services to all its residents. He opposed the closing of an elementary school; even though most gay people in the Castro did not have children, Milk saw his neighborhood having the potential to welcome everyone. He told his aides to concentrate on fixing
pothole A pothole is a depression in a road surface, usually asphalt pavement, where traffic has removed broken pieces of the pavement. It is usually the result of water in the underlying soil structure and traffic passing over the affected area. Wate ...
s and boasted that 50 new stop signs had been installed in District 5. Responding to city residents' largest complaint about living in San Francisco—dog feces—Milk made it a priority to enact the ordinance requiring dog owners to take care of their pets' droppings. Randy Shilts noted, "some would claim Harvey was a socialist or various other sorts of ideologues, but, in reality, Harvey's political philosophy was never more complicated than the issue of dogshit; government should solve people's basic problems." Karen Foss, a communications professor at the University of New Mexico, attributes Milk's impact on San Francisco politics to the fact that he was unlike anyone else who had held public office in the city. She writes, "Milk happened to be a highly energetic, charismatic figure with a love of theatrics and nothing to lose ... Using laughter, reversal, transcendence, and his insider/outsider status, Milk helped create a climate in which dialogue on issues became possible. He also provided a means to integrate the disparate voices of his various constituencies."Foss, Karen. "The Logic of Folly in the Political Campaigns of Harvey Milk", in ''Queer Words, Queer Images'', Jeffrey Ringer, ed. (1994), New York University Press. . Milk had been a rousing speaker since he began campaigning in 1973, and his oratory skills only improved after he became City Supervisor. His most famous talking points became known as the "Hope Speech", which became a staple throughout his political career. It opened with a play on the accusation that gay people recruit impressionable youth into their numbers: "My name is Harvey Milk—and I want to recruit you." A version of the Hope Speech that he gave near the end of his life was considered by his friends and aides to be the best, and the closing the most effective:
And the young gay people in the Altoona, Pennsylvanias and the Richmond, Minnesotas who are coming out and hear Anita Bryant in television and her story. The only thing they have to look forward to is hope. And you have to give them hope. Hope for a better world, hope for a better tomorrow, hope for a better place to come to if the pressures at home are too great. Hope that all will be all right. Without hope, not only gays, but the blacks, the seniors, the handicapped, the us'es, the us'es will give up. And if you help elect to the central committee and other offices, more gay people, that gives a green light to all who feel disenfranchised, a green light to move forward. It means hope to a nation that has given up, because if a gay person makes it, the doors are open to everyone.
In the last year of his life, Milk emphasized that gay people should be more visible to help to end the discrimination and violence against them. Although Milk had not come out to his mother before her death many years before, in his final statement during his taped prediction of his assassination, he urged others to do so:
I cannot prevent anyone from getting angry, or mad, or frustrated. I can only hope that they'll turn that anger and frustration and madness into something positive, so that two, three, four, five hundred will step forward, so the gay doctors will come out, the gay lawyers, the gay judges, gay bankers, gay architects ... I hope that every professional gay will say 'enough', come forward and tell everybody, wear a sign, let the world know. Maybe that will help.
However, Milk's assassination has become entwined with his political efficacy, partly because he was killed at the zenith of his popularity. Historian Neil Miller writes, "No contemporary American gay leader has yet to achieve in life the stature Milk found in death."Miller, p. 408. His legacy has become ambiguous; Randy Shilts concludes his biography writing that Milk's success, murder, and the inevitable injustice of White's verdict represented the experience of all gays. Milk's life was "a metaphor for the homosexual experience in America".Shilts, p. 348. According to Frances FitzGerald, Milk's legend has been unable to be sustained as no one appeared able to take his place in the years after his death: "The Castro saw him as a martyr but understood his martyrdom as an end rather than a beginning. He had died, and with him a great deal of the Castro's optimism, idealism, and ambition seemed to die as well. The Castro could find no one to take his place in its affections, and possibly wanted no one."FitzGerald, Frances (July 28, 1986). "A Reporter at Large: The Castro—II", ''The New Yorker'', pp. 44–63. On the 20th anniversary of Milk's death, historian John D'Emilio said, "The legacy that I think he would want to be remembered for is the imperative to live one's life at all times with integrity."Cloud, John (November 10, 1998). "Why Milk is Still Fresh: Twenty Years After his Assassination, Harvey Milk Still Has a Lot to Offer the Gay Life", ''The Advocate'', (772) p. 29. For a political career so short, Cleve Jones attributes more to his assassination than his life: "His murder and the response to it made permanent and unquestionable the full participation of gay and lesbian people in the political process."


Tributes and media

The City of San Francisco has paid tribute to Milk by naming several locations after him.The Harvey Milk Recreational Arts Center is headquarters for the drama and performing arts programs for the city's youth.
Duboce Park and Harvey Milk Recreational Arts Center
, San Francisco Neighborhood Parks Council, 2008. Retrieved on September 7, 2008.) Douglass Elementary in the Castro District was renamed the Harvey Milk Civil Rights Academy in 1996

, Harvey Milk Civil Rights Academy website. Retrieved September 8, 2008.) and the Eureka Valley Branch of the
San Francisco Public Library The San Francisco Public Library is the public library system of the city and county of San Francisco. The Main Library is located at Civic Center, at 100 Larkin Street. The library system has won several awards, such as '' Library Journals ...
was also renamed in his honor in 1981. It is located at 1 José Sarria Court, named for the first openly gay man to run for public office in the United States.
Eureka Valley Library History
San Francisco Public Library website. Retrieved February 21, 2020.) On what would have been Milk's 78th birthday, a bust of his likeness was unveiled in San Francisco City Hall at the top of the grand staircase on May 22, 2008. On June 2, 2008, the bust was accepted into the city's Civic Art Collection during a meeting of the
San Francisco Arts Commission The San Francisco Arts Commission (SFAC) is the City agency that champions the arts as essential to daily life by investing in a vibrant arts community, enlivening the urban environment and shaping innovative cultural policy in San Francisco, Cal ...
. It was designed by the Eugene Daub, Firmin, Hendrickson Sculpture Group with Eugene Daub the principal sculptor. Engraved in the pedestal is a quotation from one of the audiotapes Milk recorded in the event of his assassination, which he openly predicted several times before his death. "I ask for the movement to continue because my election gave young people out there hope. You gotta give 'em hope." (Buchanan, Wyatt (May 22, 2008)
"S.F. prepares to unveil bust of Harvey Milk"
''San Francisco Chronicle''. Retrieved on September 8, 2008.) On the 82nd anniversary of his birth, a street was renamed to Harvey Milk Street in San Diego, and a new park named Harvey Milk Promenade Park was opened in Long Beach, California.

''
The Huffington Post ''HuffPost'' (formerly ''The Huffington Post'' until 2017 and sometimes abbreviated ''HuffPo'') is an American progressive news website, with localized and international editions. The site offers news, satire, blogs, and original content, and ...
''. Published May 22, 2012. Retrieved May 23, 2012.)
Where Market and Castro streets intersect in San Francisco flies an enormous Gay Pride flag, situated in Harvey Milk Plaza. The San Francisco Gay Democratic Club changed its name to the Harvey Milk Memorial Gay Democratic Club in 1978 (it is currently named the Harvey Milk Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender Democratic Club) and boasts that it is the largest Democratic organization in San Francisco. In April 2018, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors and mayor Mark Farrell approved and signed legislation renaming Terminal 1 at
San Francisco International Airport San Francisco International Airport is an international airport in an unincorporated area of San Mateo County, south of Downtown San Francisco. It has flights to points throughout North America and is a major gateway to Europe, the Middl ...
after Milk, and planned to install artwork memorializing him. This followed a previous attempt to rename the entire airport after him, which was turned down. Officially opening on July 23, 2019, Harvey Milk Terminal 1 is the world's first airport terminal named after a leader of the LGBTQ community. In New York City,
Harvey Milk High School Harvey Milk High School (HMHS) is a public high school in the East Village of Lower Manhattan in New York City designed for, though not limited to, gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender young people, as well as those questioning their sexuali ...
is a school program for at-risk youth that concentrates on the needs of gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender students and operates out of the Hetrick Martin Institute. In July 2016, US
Secretary of the Navy The secretary of the Navy (or SECNAV) is a statutory officer () and the head (chief executive officer) of the Department of the Navy, a military department (component organization) within the United States Department of Defense. By law, the se ...
Ray Mabus advised Congress that he intended to name the second ship of the Military Sealift Command's John Lewis-class oilers USNS ''Harvey Milk''. All ships of the class are to be named after civil rights leaders. In November 2021 the ship was launched. In response to a grassroots effort, in June 2018 the city council of
Portland, Oregon Portland (, ) is a port city in the Pacific Northwest and the largest city in the U.S. state of Oregon. Situated at the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers, Portland is the county seat of Multnomah County, the most populous ...
voted to rename a thirteen-block southwestern section of Stark Street to Harvey Milk Street. The mayor, Ted Wheeler, declared that it "sends a signal that we are an open and a welcoming and an inclusive community". In 1982, freelance reporter Randy Shilts completed his first book: a biography of Milk, titled '' The Mayor of Castro Street''. Shilts wrote the book while unable to find a steady job as an openly gay reporter. '' The Times of Harvey Milk'', a documentary film based on the book's material, won the 1984 Academy Award for Documentary Feature. Director Rob Epstein spoke later about why he chose the subject of Milk's life: "At the time, for those of us who lived in San Francisco, it felt like it was life changing, that all the eyes of the world were upon us, but in fact most of the world outside of San Francisco had no idea. It was just a really brief, provincial, localized current events story that the mayor and a city council member in San Francisco were killed. It didn't have much reverberation." Milk was also the subject of Helene Meyers work, "Got Jewish Milk: Screening Epstein and Van Sant for Intersectional Film History", which explored the contemporary depiction of Milk and his "Jewishness". Milk's life has been the subject of a musical theater production; an eponymous opera; a
cantata A cantata (; ; literally "sung", past participle feminine singular of the Italian verb ''cantare'', "to sing") is a vocal composition with an instrumental accompaniment, typically in several movements, often involving a choir. The meaning o ...
; a children's picture book; a French-language historical novel for young-adult readers; and the biopic ''
Milk Milk is a white liquid food produced by the mammary glands of mammals. It is the primary source of nutrition for young mammals (including breastfed human infants) before they are able to digest solid food. Immune factors and immune-modulat ...
'', released in 2008 after 15 years in the making. The film was directed by
Gus Van Sant Gus Green Van Sant Jr. (born July 24, 1952) is an American film director, producer, photographer, and musician. He has earned acclaim as both an independent and mainstream filmmaker. His films typically deal with themes of marginalized subcultu ...
and starred
Sean Penn Sean Justin Penn (born August 17, 1960) is an American actor and film director. He has won two Academy Awards, for his roles in the mystery drama ''Mystic River'' (2003) and the biopic ''Milk'' (2008). Penn began his acting career in televisi ...
as Milk and Josh Brolin as Dan White, and won two
Academy Award The Academy Awards, better known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international film industry. The awards are regarded by many as the most prestigious, significant awards in the entertainment ind ...
s for Best Original Screenplay and Best Actor. It took eight weeks to film, and often used extras who had been present at the actual events for large crowd scenes, including a scene depicting Milk's "Hope Speech" at the 1978 Gay Freedom Day Parade. Milk was included in the "''
Time Time is the continued sequence of existence and event (philosophy), events that occurs in an apparently irreversible process, irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various me ...
'' 100 Heroes and Icons of the 20th Century" as "a symbol of what gays can accomplish and the dangers they face in doing so". Despite his antics and publicity stunts, according to writer John Cloud, "none understood how his public role could affect private lives better than Milk ... eknew that the root cause of the gay predicament was invisibility".Cloud, John (June 14, 1999)
"Harvey Milk"
''Time''. Retrieved on October 8, 2008.
'' The Advocate'' listed Milk third in their "40 Heroes" of the 20th century issue, quoting Dianne Feinstein: "His homosexuality gave him an insight into the scars which all oppressed people wear. He believed that no sacrifice was too great a price to pay for the cause of human rights." In August 2009, President
Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, Obama was the first Af ...
posthumously awarded Milk the
Presidential Medal of Freedom The Presidential Medal of Freedom is the highest civilian award of the United States, along with the Congressional Gold Medal. It is an award bestowed by the president of the United States to recognize people who have made "an especially merit ...
for his contribution to the gay rights movement stating "he fought discrimination with visionary courage and conviction". Milk's nephew Stuart accepted for his uncle. Shortly after, Stuart co-founded the Harvey Milk Foundation with Anne Kronenberg with the support of Desmond Tutu, co-recipient of 2009 Presidential Medal of Freedom and now a member of the Foundation's advisory board. Later in the year, California governor
Arnold Schwarzenegger Arnold Alois Schwarzenegger (born July 30, 1947) is an Austrian and American actor, film producer, businessman, retired professional bodybuilder and politician who served as the 38th governor of California between 2003 and 2011. ''Time'' ...
designated May 22 as Harvey Milk Day and inducted Milk in the
California Hall of Fame The California Hall of Fame honors individuals and families who embody California's innovative spirit and have made their mark on history. The hall and its exhibits are housed in The California Museum in Sacramento. The hall of fame was conceiv ...
. Since 2003, the story of Harvey Milk has been featured in three exhibitions created by the
GLBT Historical Society The GLBT Historical Society (Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender Historical Society) (formerly Gay and Lesbian Historical Society of Northern California; San Francisco Bay Area Gay and Lesbian Historical Society) maintains an extensive collection ...
, a San Francisco–based museum, archives, and research center, to which the estate of Scott Smith donated Milk's personal belongings that were preserved after his death. On May 22, 2014, the
United States Postal Service The United States Postal Service (USPS), also known as the Post Office, U.S. Mail, or Postal Service, is an independent agency of the executive branch of the United States federal government responsible for providing postal service in the ...
issued a
postage stamp A postage stamp is a small piece of paper issued by a post office, postal administration, or other authorized vendors to customers who pay postage (the cost involved in moving, insuring, or registering mail), who then affix the stamp to the f ...
honoring Harvey Milk, the first openly
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 ...
political official to receive this honor. The stamp features a photo taken in front of Milk's Castro Camera store and was unveiled on what would have been his 84th birthday. Harry Britt summarized Milk's impact the evening Milk was shot in 1978: "No matter what the world has taught us about ourselves, we can be beautiful and we can get our thing together ... Harvey was a prophet ... he lived by a vision ... Something very special is going to happen in this city and it will have Harvey Milk's name on it." In 2010, radio producer
JD Doyle JD Doyle (born September 24, 1947) is an American LGBT music and history archivist/historian and radio producer. He is a staff member of the weekly radio show Queer Voices and produces the monthly radio shows ''Queer Music Heritage'' and ''OutR ...
aired the two-hour Harvey Milk Music on his
Queer Music Heritage JD Doyle (born September 24, 1947) is an American LGBT music and history archivist/historian and radio producer. He is a staff member of the weekly radio show Queer Voices and produces the monthly radio shows ''Queer Music Heritage'' and ''Out ...
radio program. The mission of the broadcast was to gather music about and inspired by the Harvey Milk story. That broadcast and playlist of songs is archived online. Milk was inducted in 2012 into the
Legacy Walk The Legacy Walk is an outdoor public display on North Halsted Street in Chicago, Illinois, United States, which celebrates LGBT contributions to world history and culture. According to its website, it is "the world's only outdoor museum walk and y ...
, an outdoor public display in Chicago which celebrates
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 ...
history and people. He was named one of the inaugural fifty American "pioneers, trailblazers, and heroes" inducted on the National LGBTQ Wall of Honor within the Stonewall National Monument (SNM) 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 ...
's Stonewall Inn. Paris, France named a square Place Harvey-Milk in Le Marais in 2019. The USNS ''Harvey Milk'', a
United States Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage ...
oiler launched on 6 November 2021, bears his name: it is the first U.S. Navy ship named for an openly gay leader. In July 2016,
United States Secretary of the Navy The secretary of the Navy (or SECNAV) is a statutory officer () and the head (chief executive officer) of the Department of the Navy, a military department (component organization) within the United States Department of Defense. By law, the se ...
Ray Mabus advised Congress that he intended to name the Military Sealift Command's John Lewis-class oilers after prominent
civil rights Civil and political rights are a class of rights that protect individuals' freedom from infringement by governments, social organizations, and private individuals. They ensure one's entitlement to participate in the civil and political life ...
leaders, with the second to be named for gay rights activist Harvey Milk. Milk served in the U.S. Navy during the
Korean War {{Infobox military conflict , conflict = Korean War , partof = the Cold War and the Korean conflict , image = Korean War Montage 2.png , image_size = 300px , caption = Clockwise from top:{ ...
aboard the submarine rescue ship and held the rank of
lieutenant (junior grade) Lieutenant junior grade is a junior commissioned officer rank used in a number of navies. United States Lieutenant (junior grade), commonly abbreviated as LTJG or, historically, Lt. (j.g.) (as well as variants of both abbreviations), ...
at the time that he was forced to accept an "other than honorable" discharge rather than face a court martial for his
homosexuality Homosexuality is Romance (love), romantic attraction, sexual attraction, or Human sexual activity, sexual behavior between members of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality is "an enduring pattern of emotional, romant ...
. The ship was officially named at a ceremony in
San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17t ...
on 16 August 2016, generating some controversy considering Milk's antiwar stance later in his life. It is the first U.S. Navy ship named for an openly gay leader. The first cut of steel occurred on 13 December 2019, marking the beginning of construction of the vessel.


See also

*
LGBT culture in San Francisco The lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community in San Francisco is one of the largest and most prominent LGBT communities in the United States, and is one of the most important in the history of American LGBT rights and activism al ...
* LGBT social movements * List of assassinated American politicians *
List of civil rights leaders Civil rights leaders are influential figures in the promotion and implementation of political freedom and the expansion of personal civil liberties and rights. They work to protect individuals and groups from political repressio ...
* Kathy Kozachenko


Notes


References


Bibliography

* Carter, David (2004). ''Stonewall: The Riots that Sparked the Gay Revolution'', St. Martin's Press. * Clendinen, Dudley, and Nagourney, Adam (1999). ''Out for Good: The Struggle to Build a Gay Rights Movement in America'', Simon & Schuster. * de Jim, Strange (2003). ''San Francisco's Castro'', Arcadia Publishing. * Duberman, Martin (1999). ''Left Out: the Politics of Exclusion: Essays, 1964–1999'', Basic Books. * Hinckle, Warren (1985). ''Gayslayer! The Story of How Dan White Killed Harvey Milk and George Moscone & Got Away With Murder'', Silver Dollar Books. * Leyland, Winston, ed (2002). ''Out In the Castro: Desire, Promise, Activism'', Leyland Publications. * Marcus, Eric (2002). ''Making Gay History'', HarperCollins Publishers. * Miller, Neil (1994) ''Out of the Past: Gay and Lesbian History from 1869 to the Present'', Vintage Books. * Shilts, Randy (1982). ''The Mayor of Castro Street: The Life and Times of Harvey Milk'', St. Martin's Press. * Smith, Raymond, Haider-Markel, Donald, eds., (2002). ''Gay and Lesbian Americans and Political Participation'', ABC-CLIO. * Weiss, Mike (2010). ''Double Play: The Hidden Passions Behind the Double Assassination of George Moscone and Harvey Milk'', Vince Emery Productions.


Further reading

* * Jones, Cleve, with Dawson, Jeff (2000). ''Stitching a Revolution: The Making of an Activist''. * * * Meason, Christopher, ed (2009). ''Milk: A Pictorial History of Harvey Milk'', NewMarket Press.


External links

* *
Harvey Milk Foundation

Official Harvey Milk Day Website


holds the Harvey Milk Archives–Scott Smith Collection.
Harvey Milk photo history by Strange de Jim, with photos by Daniel Nicoletta





Harvey Milk City Hall Memorial
Organization dedicated to placing a bust of Harvey Milk in San Francisco's City Hall.
Harvey Milk Center for the Arts


by Chuck Wolfe
The Unknown Adventures of Harvey Milk in Dallas
by Vince Emery


Archival resources


The Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender Historical Society
Holds artifacts of Milk, including the suit he was wearing when shot by Dan White
Harvey Milk Archives—Scott Smith Collection, 1930–1995
held at the
San Francisco Public Library The San Francisco Public Library is the public library system of the city and county of San Francisco. The Main Library is located at Civic Center, at 100 Larkin Street. The library system has won several awards, such as '' Library Journals ...
, James C. Hormel LGBTQIA Center. {{DEFAULTSORT:Milk, Harvey 1930 births 1978 deaths 1978 murders in the United States 20th-century American politicians Activists from the San Francisco Bay Area American LGBT military personnel American manslaughter victims American people of Lithuanian-Jewish descent Articles containing video clips American Ashkenazi Jews Assassinated American activists Assassinated American politicians California Democrats Castro District, San Francisco Deaths by firearm in California Gay politicians Jewish American people in California politics Jewish human rights activists Jewish American military personnel LGBT Jews LGBT city councillors from the United States LGBT history in San Francisco LGBT people from San Francisco LGBT people from New York (state) LGBT rights activists from the United States Male murder victims Military personnel from New York City Murdered American Jews People from Bay Shore, New York People from Woodmere, New York People murdered in California Politicians from New York City Presidential Medal of Freedom recipients San Francisco Board of Supervisors members United States Navy officers University at Albany, SUNY alumni Bay Shore High School alumni LGBT educators