Hundreds of couples wed at SF City Hall, celebrate ‘Winter of Love’

SAN FRANCISCO (KRON) — Newlywed couples and couples renewing their vows celebrated San Francisco’s 20th anniversary of the “Winter of Love,” a historic milestone that took place in 2004 when then-mayor Gavin Newsom directed city officials to begin issuing same-sex marriage licenses.

The official “Winter of Love” ran from February 12-March 12, 2004. Wednesday’s celebration at
City Hall married hundreds of couples for the city’s annual Valentine’s Day celebration of love.

Nearly 200 couples were registered with the County Clerk’s Office to be married by the end of the day. Mayor London Breed and other city officials officiated marriages and led vow renewal ceremonies for couples in love.

San Francisco “centers our values around equality and inclusivity, and I am so proud of
everything we have accomplished for the LGTBQ community here and around the world. In San
Francisco, love is always at the center of who we are,” Breed said.

Two decades ago, same-sex marriage was prohibited under state and federal law. San Francisco’s historic actions that year and the legal battles that followed paved the way for achieving marriage equality nationwide. On February 10, 2004, Newsom made history when he wrote to then-county clerk Nancy Alfaro, urging her to alter the template for marriage licenses to
accommodate a same-sex couples.

Newsom said, “During the historic ‘Winter of Love’ in San Francisco, people of all backgrounds came together to champion human dignity. In those few weeks we learned to listen to people, not pundits; focus on fairness, not tradition; and err on the side of inclusion. The actions taken by countless individuals garnered overwhelming support for equality and protections everyone deserves.”

City officials worked quickly to update the form. On the morning of February 12, then-assessor recorder Mabel Teng married LGBTQ-rights activists Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon in a small,
quiet ceremony in Teng’s City Hall office. A handful of other couples followed, including Stuart
Gaffney and John Lewis, who upon hearing the news, rushed to City Hall to be wed.

“When we said ‘I do,’ we felt for the first time ever that our government was treating us as equal human beings as LGBTQ people, and that our love was being given full dignity and respect under the law. It was the most romantic Valentine’s Day weekend imaginable with City Hall filled with couples,” Gaffney and Lewis wrote Wednesday.

Lewis added, “It was really, really powerful. What happened here in City Hall awakened a great coming out of LGBT people about their relationships.”

In the days following, hundreds of couples lined the block around City Hall to get married,
prompting city officials to keep City Hall open through Valentine’s Day weekend to continue
marriages. Between February 12 and March 11, 2004, San Francisco issued over 4,000 marriage
licenses to same-sex couples.

While the California Supreme Court ordered the city to halt the marriages on March 11, 2004
and later annulled the marriages, Newsom’s directive propelled the city’s legal fight for marriage equality, led by then-city attorney Dennis Herrera.

Herrera said, “I would walk that line every day when I came into work, and I’d hear their stories. They talked about the difference this was making in their lives and what it meant. It was the honor of my professional life to be a part of the legal fight for marriage equality in California, from defending then-mayor Newsom’s decision to issue same-sex marriage licenses in 2004 to the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark rulings in 2013. It was a long fight, and there were ups and downs. But throughout it all, the best reward was seeing the joy on people’s faces.”

Same-sex marriage was legalized in all 50 states in 2015.

Gaffney and Lewis renewed their marriage vows at City Hall Wednesday. Leading the ceremony, Breed declared, “I again pronounce you husbands for life.”

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