Some decades ago, B&Bs could have signs outside their doors stating "No gays, no blacks, no Irish", recalls Ben Summerskill, chief executive of the Stonewall gay rights group.
Ad hoc municipal committees were meeting in rooms once used for trials and interrogations; paper signs hung on the doors, stating their new purpose.
Following a comprehensive training, participants are given a sticker, which they can affix to their classroom or office doors stating that their room is a safe zone for discussions related to sexual and gender identities, and that if students have any questions, they can come to the person who displays the sticker to receive resources and referrals.
But as important is the next-door state of Liberia, now properly democratic.
Last month in the northern state of Durango, a group of prisoners was apparently released from jail for the night to murder 18 partygoers in a next-door state.
Accidents in Delaware county in Pennsylvania increased by 26% after the next-door state of Delaware introduced a smoking ban in 2002.
The state has not voted for a Democratic president since Jimmy Carter in 1976 and he was a Southern Baptist, a military veteran and the governor of the next-door state of Georgia.
But the Wisconsin governor, whose fortunes have been surging of late, can ill-afford to alienate a next-door state like Iowa, full of pious, thrifty midwestern conservatives in his image.
Eight people were arrested for resisting and obstructing when they tried to push past two troopers guarding the Senate door, state police Inspector Gene Adamczyk said.
Take it door-to-door, state-by-state to win.
