Gayola

Gayola was a type of bribe used by American police departments against gay bars in the post-war era.

According to historian Christopher Agee, the San Francisco Police Department in the 1950s "maintained a decentralized organizational structure that gave patrol officers great autonomy in their daily activities.

The 1951 California Supreme Court case Stoumen v. Reilly found bars and establishments could legally cater to homosexual clientele.

The majority opinion ruled in favor of the Black Cat Bar, a popular bohemian and gay hangout.

Phil S. Gibson wrote, "Unlike evidence that an establishment is reputed to be a house of prostitution, which means a place where prostitution is practiced and thus necessarily implies the doing of illegal or immoral acts on the premises, testimony that a restaurant and bar is reputed to be a meeting place for a certain class of persons contains no such implication.

"[2] Regardless of the court's decision, the San Francisco Police Department's officers continued to demand payments from gay bar owners in order for them to avoid raids.

Control bolstered the confidence of San Francisco gay bars leading to the Gayola Scandal.

The Gayola Scandal refers to cops extortion and taking of bribes from gay bar owners.

[4] The scandal began after a liquor licensor was caught extorting money from the Market Street Bar, they were arrested upon leaving with $150 in bribes taken from the owner.

Police officers aided conservative politicians in the city, "allowing thugs to intimidate voters in precincts with large black or liberal voting populations.

In his historical analysis of the period, Agee writes, "As the only officers who left their desks and monitored the patrolmen on the streets, the department's two hundred sergeants held the most policing power in the SFPD.

A group of gay bar owners revealed the SFPD's practice of extortion, and this made front-page news.

Gayola, as a form of bribery was also a common practice for New York City's gay bars in the mid-century.

Creating an internal system of bribe taking that extended beyond policemen and even ward politicians and social purity groups.