Two demonstrators hold hands with New York City Democratic mayoral candidate Bella Abzug, left, outside her apartment in Greenwich Village. Between 500 and 1000 homosexuals took to the streets to protest the defeat of the homosexual rights referendum in Florida.

Associated Press

Miami vote against gays

fires debate on their status'

New York Times

MIAMI Though Miami area residents voted overwhelmingly Tuesday to revoke broad legal protection for homosexuals, the argument over their status in society resumed full force yesterday, not only here but in other parts of the country.

The homosexual rights referendum, the first of its kind in a major U.S. city, appeared to have started a noisy national debate on a question previously discussed mainly in muted tones.

Both the winning and losing sides in the vote, which overturned an ordinance that protected homosexuals from discrimination in employment, housing and public accomodation, began drawing up plans to continue the struggle here and elsewhere.

Local homosexual leaders threatened to take their cause to court and prepared to send representatives to New York this weekend for a major conference on homosexual rights at the headquarters of the National Gay Task Force, one of the country's largest homosexual organizations.

"It's unconstitutional to subject human rights to a referendum," said John W. Campbell, chairman of the Coalition for Human Rights, the main Miami homosexual group. "We may go to court. We got beaten badly in the battle here, but the war is just beginning. We're coming out of Miami with national unity and momentum."

Exultant leaders of Miami's anti-homosexual forces offered advice and assistance to similar groups elsewhere and announced plans to establish a national office in Washington.

"We won 2 to 1, which is proof the country sees homosexuals as child molesters and religious heretics," asserted Robert Break, a top official of Save Our Children, the main anti-homosexual group here.

"We're going to set up in Washington next to fight 'gay' proposals before Congress," he said. "We'll advise and help any anti-gay group in the country that invites us in. Already we've heard from people in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., Minneapolis and San Antonio.”

Break said Anita Bryant, the singer who served as chairman of Save Our Children during the Miami campaign, would continue to take part in the spreading dispute. She flew to Norfolk, Va., yesterday for an entertainment engagement before a religious convocation. The Norfolk Coalition for Human Rights, a group formed a few weeks ago as a result of interest stirred up by the Miami issue, picketed her appearance.

The Norfolk demonstration followed earlier protests in San Francisco and New York. When the results of the Miami referendum reached those cities shortly before midnight Tuesday, scores of homosexuals poured into the streets in noisy protest.

In Washington, Eleanor Smeal, who heads the National Organization for Women, said the Miami

vote smacked of Nazi-style oppression and suggested that Save Our Children should be renamed "Save Some of Our Children Discard the Rest."

A LITTLE LEARY

1977 Los angeles Times

HE WHO THINKS A CAR MAKES YA LAZY NEVER PAID OFF ONE