VIC LEE: It's safe to say that no city in the United States is more tolerant of alternative lifestyles than San Francisco. At the Glide Memorial United Methodist Church, for example, people of any religion or no religion are more than welcome, and a special effort is made to appeal to the relatively large and influential gay and lesbian communities.Mayor WILLIE BROWN (San Francisco): I now pronounce you domestic partners.
LEE: It's not unusual for Mayor Willie Brown to officiate at same-sex union ceremonies at City Hall, even though California does not recognize these procedures as constituting a legal marriage contract.
State Senator PETE KNIGHT (California): The marriage between a man and a woman is the basic family unit.LEE: But in Sacramento, state Senator Pete Knight, who failed three times to pass a specific law against gay marriages, managed to get the initiative on the ballot. To gather the 700,000 signatures to get Prop 22 before the voters, Knight's organization reportedly received $5 million from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and $350,000 from the Catholic Bishops of California.
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LEE: A lot of money is being spent on TV ads like these.
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LEE: But people like Kira Allen and her new life partner, Linda Baldwin, don't think their lifestyle is any of the state's business.
Father JOSEPH FESSIO: I think that the most important thing for our society to continue being a prosperous and good and just society, is having strong families of a mother and a father with children. That's the best environment for bearing and raising children, and therefore, I think the state should protect that institution.
Mr. DOUGLAS CALLISTER (Mormon Elder): We were not the institution or organization that caused this to be placed on the ballot, but once it was placed there, it became apparent that Californians would need to vote one way or the other, expressing their wishes as to whether traditional marriage should be retained as the sole standard in California or whether other kinds of marriages would be acceptable.
