[5] The California recall process became law in 1911 as the result of Progressive Era reforms that spread across the United States in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

The movement in California was spearheaded by Republican Governor Hiram Johnson, a reformist, who called the recall process a "precautionary measure by which a recalcitrant official can be removed".

[12] The effort to recall Gray Davis began with Republicans Ted Costa, Mark Abernathy, and Howard Kaloogian, who filed their petition with the California Secretary of State and started gathering signatures.

[16] The political climate was largely shaped by the California electricity crisis of the early 2000s, during which many people experienced a tripling in the cost of their energy consumption as rolling blackouts happened throughout the state.

The public held Davis partly responsible, although the causes included federal deregulation and California's Electric Utility Industry Restructuring Act, signed into law by Governor Wilson.

He was said to have signed deals agreeing to pay energy companies fixed yet inflated prices for years to come based on those paid during the crisis.

Davis had accepted $2 million from the California Correctional Peace Officers Association, and used his political connections to pass an estimated $5 billion raise for them over the coming years.

The recall movement began slowly, largely relying on talk radio, a website, cooperative e-mail, word-of-mouth, and grassroots campaigning to drive the signature gathering.

Backers of the recall effort cited Davis's alleged lack of leadership, combined with California's weakened and hurt economy.

Some Californians blamed Davis and the state legislature for continuing to spend heavily while revenues dried up, ultimately leading to record deficits.

[23] Still, subsequent revelations of corporate accounting scandals and market manipulation by some Texas-based energy companies, mainly Enron, did little to quiet the criticism of Davis's handling of the crisis.

[further explanation needed] Davis swept into the governor's office in 1998 in a landslide victory and a 60% approval rating as California's economy roared to new heights during the dot-com boom.

Davis took his mandate from the voters and sought out a centrist political position, refusing some demands from labor unions and teachers' organizations on the left.

Three of Davis's aides were fired or resigned after it was revealed that the governor's technology adviser accepted a $25,000 campaign contribution shortly after the contract was signed.

He spent his campaign funds on attack ads against California Secretary of State Bill Jones and Los Angeles mayor Richard Riordan, the two well-known moderates in the Republican primary.

The result was that his opponent in the general election was conservative Republican and political newcomer Bill Simon, who was popular within his own party but unknown by the majority of the state population.

The increase tripled the vehicle license fee for the average car owner, and began appearing in renewal notices starting August 1.

The California state budget passed in late July 2003 included the projected $4 billion in increased vehicle license fee revenue.

In mid-August 2003, Davis floated a plan to reverse the increase, making up the revenue with taxes on high-income earners, cigarettes, and alcoholic beverages.

Schwarzenegger did not indicate how cities and counties would be reimbursed for the lost revenue they received from the license fee to support public safety and other local government activities.

Senator Dianne Feinstein, widely regarded as the most popular statewide office-holding Democrat in California, who cited her own experience with a recall drive while she was mayor of San Francisco.

[29] Lieutenant Governor Cruz Bustamante himself entered the race and quickly became the Democratic frontrunner, although he continued to oppose the recall and urged Californians to vote against it.

On September 9, former MLB commissioner and Los Angeles Olympic Committee President Peter Ueberroth withdrew his candidacy in the recall election.

On September 30, author Arianna Huffington withdrew her candidacy on the Larry King Live television program and announced that she was opposing the recall entirely in light of Schwarzenegger's surge in the polls.

On September 15, the judges issued a unanimous ruling postponing the recall election until March 2004, on the grounds that the existence of allegedly obsolete voting equipment in those six counties violated the equal protection constitutional guarantee, thus overruling the lower district court which had rejected this argument.

Circuit Court of Appeals and quickly and carefully canvassed by Judge Alex Kozinski, gathered to rehear the controversial case.

[40] On the morning of September 23, the panel reversed the three-judge ruling in a unanimous decision, arguing that the concerns about the punch-card ballots were outweighed by the harm that would be done by postponing the election.

The ACLU announced it would not make an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, and Davis was widely quoted in the press as saying "Let's just get it over with", and the election proceeded as planned on October 7.

With the candidacies of a few celebrities and many regular Californians, the entire affair became a joke to some (there were tongue-in-cheek references to Schwarzenegger's role in the science fiction film Total Recall) as well as an "only-in-California" event.

Among those voting on the potential replacement, Arnold Schwarzenegger received a plurality of 48.6%, surpassing Lieutenant Governor Cruz Bustamante's 31.5%, about a 3-to-2 ratio.