IMPEACH BUSH

SACRAMENTO, CALIF. — Less than two weeks before Election Day, the chief strategist behind a ballot measure outlawing same-sex marriage in California called an urgent meeting.

"We're going to lose this campaign if we don't get more money," the strategist, Frank Schubert, recalled telling leaders of Protect Marriage, the main group behind the ban.

The campaign issued an urgent appeal, and in a matter of days, it raised more than $5 million, including a stunning $1 million donation from Alan Ashton, the grandson of a former president of the Mormon Church. The money allowed the campaign to intensify an aggressive advertising campaign and support for the measure catapulted ahead, with it ultimately winning with 52 percent of the vote.

'Very important test'

As proponents of same-sex marriage across the nation plan protests today against the ban, interviews with the main forces behind the ballot measure show how close its backers believe it came to defeat — and the extraordinary role Mormons played in helping to pass it with money, institutional support and dedicated volunteers.

"We've spoken out on other issues — we've spoken out on abortion, we've spoken out on those other kinds of things," said Michael Otterson, the managing director of public affairs for The Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-day Saints, as the Mormons are formally called, in Salt Lake City. "But we don't get involved to the degree we did on this."

The California measure, Proposition 8, was to many Mormons a kind of firewall to be held at all costs.

"California is a huge state, often seen as a bellwether — this was seen as a very, very important test," Otterson said.

First approached by the Roman Catholic archbishop of San Francisco a few weeks after the California Supreme Court legalized same-sex marriage in May, the Mormons were the last major religious group to join the campaign, and the final spice in an unusual stew that included Catholics, evangelical Christians, conservative black and Latino pastors, and myriad smaller ethnic groups.

Shortly after receiving the invitation from the San Francisco archdiocese, the Mormon leadership in Salt Lake City issued a four-paragraph decree to be read to congregations urging members to become involved with the cause.

"And they sure did," said Schubert.

Jeff Flint, another strategist with Protect Marriage, estimated that Mormons made up about 80 to 90 percent of the early volunteers who walked election precincts.

Emergency meeting

By mid-October, most independent polls showed support for the proposition was growing, but it was still trailing on Election Day.

Opponents of the measure had brought on new media consultants in the face of the slipping poll numbers, but they were still effectively raising money, including $3.9 million at a star-studded fundraiser held at the Beverly Hills home of Ron Burkle, the supermarket billionaire and longtime supporter of liberal causes.

It was then that Schubert called his meeting in Sacramento. "I said, 'As good as our stuff is, it can't withstand that kind of funding,' " he recalled.

The response was a desperate e-mail message sent to 92,000 people who had registered at the group's Web site declaring a "code blue" — an urgent plea for money to save traditional marriage from "cardiac arrest." Schubert also sent an e-mail message to the three top religious members of his executive committee, representing Catholics, evangelicals and Mormons.

"I ask for your prayers that this e-mail will open the hearts and minds of the faithful to make a further sacrifice of their funds at this urgent moment so that God's precious gift of marriage is preserved," he wrote.

On Oct. 28, Ashton, the grandson of former Mormon president David McKay, came forward with his $1 million donation. Ashton, who made his fortune as co-founder of the WordPerfect Corporation, said he was following his personal beliefs and the direction of the church.

In the end, Protect Marriage estimates, that as much as half of the nearly $40 million raised on behalf of the measure was contributed by Mormons.