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 sexual orientation.

"[3] Within two years Jerry Falwell developed a coalition of conservative religious groups named the Moral Majority that influenced the Republican Party to incorporate a social agenda in national politics.

[13] In 1960, she married a Miami disc jockey named Bob Green and became a professional singer, finding some success with three gold records featuring popular, patriotic, and Gospel standards.

Bryant reflected most of those opposing the law, telling the Dade County Commission, "The ordinance condones immorality and discriminates against my children's rights to grow up in a healthy, decent community".

[4] The few members of the Dade County Coalition for the Humanistic Rights of Gays who were present were stunned, as was Ruth Shack, at the number and force of the hundreds of protesters who filled the commission room, and held placards and pickets outside.

[18] After the ordinance passed, over thirty conservative political professionals and ministers from various faiths met in Bryant and Green's home to discuss a plan to raise publicity and attempt to get at least 10,000 signatures on a petition to force the issue to be decided by a county voter referendum.

North Carolina senator Jesse Helms offered his staff and funding from the Congressional Club, and wrote in his column that he was proud of Bryant: "I have pledged my full support to her ... She is fighting for decency and morality in America—and that makes her, in my book, an all-American lady".

Mainstream news outlets such as The New York Times, Associated Press and Washington Post reported weekly updates on campaign progress, with smaller local newspapers across the country weighing in their editorial opinions on which side should prevail.

Florida Senator Dempsey Barron vocally opposed passing the ERA, fearing it would legalize same-sex marriages, force people to use unisex bathrooms, and that it would harm laws meant to protect families.

[43] All America and all the world will hear what the people have said, and with God's continued help, we will prevail in our fight to repeal similar laws throughout the nation which attempt to legitimize a life style that is both perverse and dangerous.

Due to the intensely closeted nature of Miami's gay community at that time, many voters who were not swayed by Bryant's rhetoric were persuaded instead by her campaign's point that the law was unnecessary; they were unable to see the problem of discrimination.

Bryant danced a jig when the response was announced, and told reporters "All America and all the world will hear what the people have said, and with God's continued help, we will prevail in our fight to repeal similar laws throughout the nation which attempt to legitimize a life style that is both perverse and dangerous".

[53] In The New York Times, conservative columnist William Safire wrote that Miami's gay activists had been justifiably defeated: "In the eyes of the vast majority, homosexuality is an abnormality, a mental illness, even—to use an old-fashioned word—a sin.

"[54] Safire, however, tempered the column (titled "Now Ease Up, Anita") cautioning against Bryant's promised nationwide crusade designed to lead to further repeal of homosexuals' "legitimate civil rights".

[55] Two weeks after the Dade County vote, a gardener who worked for the City of San Francisco named Robert Hillsborough was stabbed 15 times in his face and chest while his attackers chanted "Faggot" at him.

[67] The Florida Citrus Commission reiterated its commitment to Bryant by stating that it "wholeheartedly support(ed)" her right to free speech, praising her "courageous leadership on a moral issue that it is tearing up religious and other organizations which have become involved".

[70] In the weeks after the Dade County vote, Fort Lauderdale, Gainesville, and Palm Beach, Florida, and Austin, Texas, all rejected ordinances to outlaw discrimination based on sexual orientation.

[citation needed] Only three weeks before the voter referendum in Dade County, a state gay rights law to protect homosexuals from discrimination in employment, public services, and housing in Minnesota was defeated.

[73] Following the pie attack on the archbishop, two of Allan Spear's colleagues invited Anita Bryant to come to St. Paul to overturn their three-year-old gay rights ordinance, and announced Save Our Children would be opening a branch there.

[74] In October 1977 Bryant and her husband were in Des Moines, Iowa, discussing an upcoming concert at a press conference when Thom Higgins, an activist affiliated with organizers in Minneapolis, walked in front of live television cameras to mash a banana cream pie in her face.

Volunteers endured below-freezing temperatures to collect more than 7,000 signatures; their leader, Richard Angwin, pastor of Temple Baptist reasoned, "I don't want to live in a community that gives respect to homosexuals.

[87] Estes designed a ballot measure named Initiative Thirteen that would overturn the existing gay rights ordinance, but also allowed the mere accusation of homosexuality to be the basis for dismissal from a job or eviction from a residence.

[95] Gay activists, newly alarmed at the threat to their rights, confronted Vice President Walter Mondale at a political rally in San Francisco two weeks after the announcement of Proposition 6.

"[111] In the late 1970s the Reverend Jerry Falwell moved from presiding over the megachurch Thomas Road Baptist Church in Lynchburg, Virginia, and hosting the Old Time Gospel Hour, to being involved in politics.

[112] In 1979 Falwell spearheaded a coalition of religious groups that included Catholics, fundamentalist Protestants, Mormons, and Orthodox Jews that he called the Moral Majority, which developed a branch dedicated to political action.

[113] Falwell declared in 1965 that he had no business in politics,[114] but justified his involvement and the inevitable mix of religion and government with evidence that the social problems of abortion, pornography, sexual immorality, and drugs were bringing the United States to a dangerous precipice where Communism would prevail over Christianity.

Spokesmen for the Moral Majority connected it to God's will, asserting the general public needed protection from "the gay plague", and warned, "If homosexuals are not stopped they will infect the entire nation and America will be destroyed.

[119] The birth of a political life for gays and lesbians gave opportunities for national networking as Anita Bryant and those who followed her acted as a virtual lightning rod, attracting a collective anger.

When gay men tried in several desperate measures to follow established political channels to bring attention to a disease that afflicted the most cast out members of society only to meet silence from the government, some used direct action tactics.

They blocked morning rush hour traffic, a civil disobedience action in which several protesters were arrested, and the fledgling organization received national news coverage for their demonstration.