The most contentious political issue to emerge in the 1960's was the question of the Vietnam War. Racial equality was an old story, but President Johnson's Civil Rights legislation had gone a long way toward establishing a framework for its eventual achievement, however there was no such solution for the War. Thus, by 1967 a growing vocal opposition to the War was sweeping the country. Meanwhile, in LA I was also hearing a lot of things about San Francisco, mostly about the Hippies and Haight-Ashbury, so when I read there was going to be a large demonstration against the War in San Francisco, I decided it was time to go up and see what was going on. Therefore, in April I went to join the protest.
Allen Ginsberg, the Beat Poet, had relocated to San Francisco and was a prominent figure both in the anti-war movement and also in the emerging New Age scene that was swirling around the LSD-inspired Hippie rock music /Eastern religion /Be-In movement.
The operative word in all of this was L-O-V-E!
The march itself was very impressive as it drew 100,000 people from the Bay Area and much of California to participate in what was a glorious, and peaceful protest of a war that ultimately would claim over 54,000 American lives, as well as countless Vietnamese deaths. In spite of the fact that we lost the war amidst dire threats that disastrous consequences would befall our nation and all of Southeast Asia, virtually nothing happened except that the country of Vietnam became united after decades of Colonial depredations by outside powers.
