Milk sought not only to change the stereotypes that existed about gays, but to also promote a legal framework that supports gays, including the passage of a gay rights bill, and speaking out against a barrage of legislation which would restrict gays’ civil and political liberties.īefore pioneering the fight for gay rights, Milk led a dual life like most gay men: hiding his sexual identity during the day, then going home to his domestic partner. However, for Milk, winning the election, while monumental, was just the first step in his plan to promote gay rights and equality. No matter how good that friend may be.”Īfter losing his first three campaigns, Milk was elected Supervisor of the city of San Francisco in 1977, and as the first openly gay man elected to public office in the United States, Harvey Milk had already reached a milestone in the fight for gay rights. According to Milk, “There is a major difference – and it remains a vital difference – between a friend and a gay person, a friend in office and a gay person in office…It’s not enough anymore just to have friends represent us. Milk became involved in local politics and ran for public office to encourage equality and enhance the lives of working-class San Franciscans and minorities.įrom the history of other minority groups in America, Milk knew that the only way to truly achieve equality would be for a gay person to be elected to public office. Harvey Milk was an early migrant to San Francisco’s tolerant Castro District, where he moved to live openly with his partner. However, even in this “tolerant” area, the gay community faced discrimination from local businesses, as both consumers and employees. However, in 1969 during a police raid on a gay bar in New York City, instead of running from the authorities, gays chose to protest their right to visit gay bars. The riots that followed the raid, which became known as the Stonewall Riots, led to the public exposure of police brutality, sparking the first gay rights organization in the U.S., the Gay Liberation Front, which took on a decidedly anti-war, pro-civil rights, anti-establishment identity. It was during this time that America’s gays moved to the west coast en masse, and in particular, to San Francisco.
In the mid-twentieth century, homosexuals were legally and socially discriminated against in the United States.