Tying the Not..

How the Right Succeeded in Passing Proposition 8

By Surina Khan

Surina Khan is Vice President of Programs for the Women’s Foundation of California. She is a former research analyst with Political Research Associates and a member of the Editorial Board of the Public Eye.

On June 26, 2008, 1,000 ministers, mostly from evangelical congregations, met by conference call to discuss tactics for passing Proposition 8, a ballot initiative to ban same sex marriage in California by amending the state constitution. The call was convened by Pastor Jim Garlow from the 2,500-member Skyline Church in San Diego County. The ministers on the call had a far reach: they lead congregations representing about one million people, and Garlow alone provides radio commentary to 629 stations each day.

The strategy session, which included input from lawyers and political consultants, was one of many efforts in a broad-based organizing campaign by the Christian Right to galvanize support for Proposition 8.

Proposition 8 passed in the November 2008 election by four points, with 52 percent of voters supporting it and 48 percent opposing it. The Right was successful in their multipronged approach to oppose same-sex marriage in a state that has national significance in the marriage equality movement. Simply put, they out organized the No on 8 Campaign.

An analysis of how the Right succeeded in their efforts reveals a campaign of misinformation and unlikely alliances that took years of planning, dating back to at least the mid-1990s. It also reveals a shrewd, media-savvy, well-funded and well-organized grassroots movement that understood California’s complex geographic and political landscape. The Yes on 8 campaign effectively reached California’s diverse racial and ethnic communities with materials translated into at least fourteen different languages including Spanish, Hmong, Vietnamese, Chinese, Filipino, Samoan, Punjabi, Farsi, Russian, and Polish.

http://www.publiceye.org/magazine/v23n4/proposition_8.html