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Category: lgbt

  • Color them proud for Pride: Butch Lesbians of the ’50s, ’60s, and ’70s Coloring Book

    The Butch Lesbians of the ’50s, ’60s, and ’70s Coloring Book proved so popular a second edition is due just two months after the first print run.

    The sequel to The Butch Lesbians of the ’20s, ’30s, and ’40s Coloring Book contains 40 pages to color, as well as profiles by editors Jon Macy and Avery Cassell of colorful butches who were activists, artists, gender outlaws and feminist warriors.

    The coloring book contains images and biographies of blues singer Gladys Bentley, author Jane Rule, powerboat racer Joe Carstairs, filmmaker Esther Eng, curator Adrienne Fuzee, photographer Honey Lee Cottress, singer Chavela Vargas, artist Margo Rivera-Weiss, anthropologist Esther Newton, actress Pat Bond, sex worker Frede Baulé, critic Butchy McCausland, activist Donna Burkett and more.

    Burkett, whose page was drawn by Ajuan Manch, should be a name known in Milwaukee’s LGBT community.

    Her profile reads, “Donna Burkett came out at age 7, ran away to join the Army at age 16, quit the army due to racism and joined the civil rights and gay movements. On October 1, 1971, she and her girlfriend Manonia Evans applied for a marriage license in Milwaukee, were rejected and went to federal court over their right to marry.”

    Note: This story was originally published in the Wisconsin Gazette.

  • Little LGBT lessons: A history and activity book for kids

    A new LGBT history from Chicago Review Press is kid-friendly and mom-approved — make that two moms.

    Gay & Lesbian History for Kids: The Century-Long Struggle for LGBT Rights is stocked with stories, quotes, photographs and nearly two dozen activities.

    LGBT parents will be over the rainbow with the book by Jerome Pohlen, a former elementary school science teacher and the author of the well-received Albert Einstein and Relativity for Kids. And so will their kids.

    WiG tested the book’s appeal with an informal book club of six: three parents, ages 24–57, and three kids, ages 7–14.

    The parents described the book as lively, engaging and informative. The timeline begins in 570 BC, with the death of the Greek poet Sappho and continues through 2015, concluding with the U.S. Supreme Court ruling for marriage equality in all 50 states. The 192 pages contain a condensed but comprehensive narrative about the movement and milestones, legends and the legendary. The story of Harvey Milk is told, but also those of lesser-known historical figures, like Gen. Friedrich Wilhelm von Steuben, who served as George Washington’s chief of staff in the American Revolution.

    Chapters include the early history, the birth of a movement in the early 1900s, life in the shadows of the 1940s and 1950s, coming out in the 1960s, mobilizing in the streets in the 1970s, acting up in the 1980s, setbacks and advances in the 1990s, and the milestone achievements of this new century. The book opens with an introduction about “two moms” and concludes with an afterword about “everyday heroes.”

    “I think it has something for everyone,” said Chrissy Williams of Madison, a mother of two children. “I learned a few things. Well, actually, I learned a lot.”

    The kids focused more on the activities than the histories.

    “It didn’t feel like learning at all,” said Williams’ 12-year-old daughter, Amy.

    The book guides children through:

    • Writing a free verse poem after reading Walt Whitman’s “Song of the Open Road.”

    • Inventing a secret language after learning about Oscar Wilde and an era when green carnations and red neckties signaled “family.”

    • Singing the blues, with inspiration from the songs of Bessie Smith, Ethel Waters, Ma Rainey and Gladys Bentley.

    • Practicing “The Madison” after reading that same-sex couples would be arrested for touching on the dance floor, so they began line dancing instead.

    • Designing a flag, after reading about symbolism and the creation of the rainbow Pride flag.

    A favorite activity instructed kids to ask adults about the boycotts they joined and the results. The kids in WiG’s book club took the activity to another level and agreed to boycott “bad people like Donald Trump,” “kale” and “homework.”

    Perhaps the most unusual activity in the book involves conducting an inkblot test, using five sheets of construction paper, a jar of dark poster paint, a pen and a sheet of notebook paper.

    Readers learn that, in the 1950s, sex researcher and psychologist Evelyn Hooker gave her subjects the Rorschach Test, seeking clues about how they think by showing them a series of inkblots. Then the kids make and conduct the test — an activity guaranteed to prompt some laughs and occupy them for at least an hour this summer.

    Finalists for kids

    The 28th Annual Lambda Literary Awards, also known as Lammys, will be presented June 6.

    Finalists in the category for children’s and young adult books include:

    • Gay and Lesbian History for Kids: The Century-Long Struggle for LGBT Rights by Jerome Pohlen from Chicago Review Press.

    • About a Girl: A Novel by Sarah McCarry from St. Martin’s Griffin.

    • Anything Could Happen by Will Walton from Push.

    • George by Alex Gino from Scholastic Press.

    • The Marvels by Brian Selznick from Scholastic Press.

    • More Happy Than Not by Adam Silvera from Soho Teen.

    • None of the Above by IW Gregorio from Balzer + Bray/ Harper Collins.

    • Simon vs. The Homo Sapiens Agenda by Becky Albertalli from Balzer + Bray/Harper Collins.

    — Lisa Neff

  • On top of the world: Iceland No. 1 on LGBT Global Acceptance Index

    As Donald Trump campaigned for the White House in 2016, polls showed 19–25 percent of Americans said they’d consider moving to Canada if he won.

    Surveys put that percentage even higher among LGBT voters.

    But perhaps LGBT Americans should have been looking to move to Iceland, the Netherlands or Sweden, places that rank No. 1, No. 2 and No. 3 on the Global Acceptance Index. Canada ranks higher than the United States, but not by far, though the rating is based on data from before Trump took the White House.

    The Global Acceptance Index was created to measure LGBT acceptance and inclusion and its effects. UCLA’s Williams Institute recently released a series of studies that include rankings of 141 countries on their level of social acceptance of LGBT people and rights since 1980.

    Acceptance, in the studies, refers to social beliefs about LGBT people, as well as the prevailing opinion about laws and policies that protect — or harm — LGBT people.

    In the study “Polarized Progress: Social Acceptance of LGBT People in 141 Countries, 1981 to 2014,” the researchers documented increased acceptance in 80 countries, a decline in 46 and no statistical change in 15.

    The most accepting countries were Iceland, the Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark and Andorra — a tiny, independent principality situated between France and Spain.

    A second study released by the Williams Institute was titled “Examining the Relationship between Social Acceptance of LGBT People and Legal Inclusion of Sexual Minorities.”

    Here, the researchers found that democracies with a commitment to a free press and the rule of law had the strongest relationship between acceptance and inclusion.

    The relationship is weaker in states with autocracies.

    A third study looked at links between acceptance, legal protections and economic performance. Generally, LGBT people are economically better off in places where they are guaranteed rights.

    In this study, the researchers were able to associate higher Gross Domestic Product in countries with LGBT legal rights.

    Two key findings:

    • Having one additional legal right was associated with an increase in a country’s GDP of $1,694 per capita.

    • An increase of just one point on the Global Acceptance Index was associated with an increase in GDP of $1,506 per capita.

    “Programs that reduce violence, stigma and discrimination against LGBT people and policies that enhance access to education and health care will allow LGBT people the opportunity to realize their full economic potential, which will benefit the overall economy,” said Williams Institute researcher M.V. Lee Badgett.

    Measuring progress

    The Global Acceptance Index generates important data that allows scholars to track LGBT progress globally.

    “Very few surveys … provide sufficient data for global, cross-national comparisons of public opinion about LGBT people and rights,” said Andrew R. Flores, a visiting scholar at the Williams Institute, a think tank that focuses on public policy regarding sexual orientation and gender identity.

    “The Global Acceptance Index provides a consistent and comparable way to measure attitudes and attitude change, which could help us better understand the impact of LGBT inclusion in social, economic and political life,” he said.

    The Global Acceptance Index was created by the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law and its international collaborators in the LGBTI Global Development Partnership — a first-of-its-kind public-private partnership.

    Note: This story originally published in the Wisconsin Gazette.

  • Supreme Court watch: Wedding cake ruling muddies the equality waters, more decisions to come

    Civil rights groups emphasized the narrowness of a U.S. Supreme Court ruling this month that favored a Colorado baker who refused to serve a gay couple wanting to buy a cake for their wedding reception.

    But the ruling means more business owners will try to use their religious beliefs to discriminate against people based on their sexual orientation — or other status. Just a day after the Supreme Court ruling in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, there were news reports from around the country — Indiana, Arizona, Texas, Colorado, California and Georgia — of business owners announcing plans to refuse service or sales to LGBT people.

    Meanwhile, Jack Phillips — the baker at the center of the high court case — faced a torrent of criticism, especially on the food-focused social-media platform Yelp.

    In 2012, Charlie Craig and Dave Mullins asked Phillips, owner of Masterpiece Cakeshop in suburban Denver, to make them a wedding cake. He refused, he said, because he’s a Christian.

    The couple turned to the state of Colorado, which has legislation banning discrimination based on sexual orientation — and a process for determining whether bias has occurred.

    The Colorado Civil Rights Commission decided that Phillips discriminated against the gay couple, violating their rights.

    Phillips, represented by the right-wing Alliance Defending Freedom and supported by the Trump administration, sought a higher review and ended up before the U.S. Supreme Court.

    Arguments took place in December 2017 and the 7-2 ruling was issued June 4.

    Writing for the majority, Justice Anthony Kennedy said the state violated the baker’s rights under the First Amendment but said the broader issue of whether there can be faith-based exemptions to anti-discrimination laws “must await further elaboration.”

    Kennedy, during oral argument, signaled trouble with what appeared to him to be anti-religious comments by a member of the Colorado commission.

    “We read this decision as a reaffirmation of the court’s longstanding commitment to civil rights protections and the reality that the states have the power to protect everyone in America from discrimination,” said James Esseks, the director of the American Civil Liberties Union LGBT and HIV Project. The ACLU represented Craig and Mullins.

    The ACLU and a host of LGBT groups pointed to a passage in the decision, joined by liberals Elena Kagan and Stephen Breyer, that said disputes “must be resolved with tolerance, without undue disrespect to sincere religious beliefs, and without subjecting gay persons to indignities when they seek goods and services in an open market.”

    Still, in on-the-street interviews and on-the-web surveys by WiG, people repeatedly asked: How could the court not see Craig and Mullins were subject to indignities because of the baker’s bias?

    And clearly, each side involved in the case interpreted the decision differently.

    Esseks said the court did not say Phillips was free to turn away gay customers. Phillips’ attorney, Kristen Waggoner at the ADF, said the baker can refuse a same-sex couple service without fear of another legal fight.

    Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor dissented in Masterpiece. Ginsburg wrote, “I strongly disagree … with the court’s conclusion that Craig and Mullins should lose this case.”

    Later this month, the justices could decide to take a case involving a florist who refused to serve a same-sex couple. Other similar disputes involve video producers, graphic artists, photographers and lodgers who say they oppose same-sex marriage on religious grounds and don’t want to participate in same-sex weddings.

    “The court did not rule that the Constitution grants the right to discriminate, quite the contrary, the decision maintains the longstanding principle that business owners cannot deny equal access to goods and services,” said Vanita Gupta, president and CEO of the Leadership Conference Education fund.

    “But make no mistake,” she added, “the decision makes clear that our fight for equal rights and dignity for all must continue. Yesterday it was barbecue. Today, it’s cake. Tomorrow it will surely be something else. And we will be there fighting.”

    High court decisions to come

    Still to come this month from the court is a ruling in a potentially landmark case out of Wisconsin on partisan gerrymandering: Gill v. Whitford. The court additionally heard redistricting cases out of Texas and Maryland.

    In Gill, the court is expected to decide whether the district court had the authority to hear a statewide challenge to the GOP-crafted redistricting plan for Wisconsin rather than district-by-district, as well as whether the lower court properly held the redistricting was an impermissible partisan gerrymander.

    There are other questions before the court in Gill, a case brought to the justices by the Walker administration after losing in the lower courts. Two key ones are whether partisan-gerrymandering claims are justiciable and whether the lower court wrongly adopted what the state called a watered-down version of a partisan-gerrymander test.

    Nearing the end of their nine-month term, the justices also are due to deliver decisions in:

    • Trump v. Hawaii, on the constitutionality of President Donald Trump’s travel ban.
    • Carpenter v. United States, dealing with the warrantless seizure and search of cellphone records to track locations.
    • Janus v. American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Council 31, dealing with whether public-sector employees can refuse to pay dues to their union.
    • Minnesota Voters Alliance v. Mansky, dealing with whether a law banning political apparel at polling places violates the First Amendment.

    Note: This story originally published in the Wisconsin Gazette.

  • House Democrats stage sit-in, demand vote on gun control

    House Democrats stage sit-in, demand vote on gun control

    Democrats staged a 1960s-style sit-in on the U.S. House floor June 22–23, chanting, “No bill. No Break.” The protest was intended to call attention to Republicans’ inaction against gun violence in the wake of the largest mass shooting in modern history at a gay dance club in Orlando.

    House Speaker Paul Ryan responded by shutting off all public access to the scene.

    “Speaker Ryan may have turned off the floor cameras in an attempt to silence us, but we will continue to stand up and give a voice to the majority of Americans who demand commonsense gun safety reforms,” said U.S. Rep. Mark Pocan, D-Madison.

    U.S. Rep. John Lewis of Georgia, a longtime veteran of the civil rights movement, organized the protest along with Reps. Katherine Clark of Massachusetts and David Cicilline of Rhode Island.

    In the hours that Democrats held the floor, they spoke about an epidemic of violence in the United States. With the blackout on C-SPAN’s coverage — the service does not control the floor cameras — members took videos of each other to share on social media.

    California Democrat Eric Swalwell videotaped New York Congressman Jerrold Nadler’s speech, delivered at about 2 a.m. June 23.

    “No other country in the world, other than those involved in active wars, have gun deaths more than three digits,” Nadler said. … We have 33,000 a year. We’re told this is because of insanity. Because we have mentally ill people. But we don’t have thousands of times more mentally ill people than other countries.”

    Nadler said if House Republicans refuse to pass an assault weapons ban or prohibit large capacity clips, they could at least close the loopholes in background checks and bar people on the no-fly list from gun purchases.

    Ryan dismissed the sit-in as a political stunt.

    He also dismissed the idea of “no fly, no buy,” saying it would deprive people of due process and the constitutional right to possess guns.

    Meanwhile, in the U.S. Senate, Democrats continued to press for reform even after failed votes on measures to expand background checks and keep people on the no-fly list from getting guns.

    President Barack Obama and presumptive Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton echoed the calls for tighter gun laws. Clinton, early in her campaign, made enacting gun control measures a priority.

    Donald Trump, the presumptive GOP nominee for president, suggested the solution to gun violence is arming more people with guns.

    “It’s too bad that some of the young people that were killed over the weekend didn’t have guns, you know, attached to their hips, and you know where bullets could have flown in the opposite direction,” Trump told radio host Howie Carr on June 13, the day after the shooting in Orlando. Later, Trump said he was referring to guards and employees.

    Chad Griffin, the president and CEO of the Human Rights Campaign, said the shooting was a “toxic combination of two things: a deranged, unstable individual who had been conditioned to hate people and easy access to military-style guns.”

    HRC is the nation’s largest LGBT civil rights group. In late June, its board of directors adopted a resolution on gun control measures, an unprecedented move for the group.

    Americans are divided on gun control.

    Polls put those favoring gun control over gun rights at about 50 percent, down from 57 percent in 2000. Those who favor gun rights over gun control increased from about 29 percent in 2000 to 47 percent in 2015.

    When particular gun control steps are considered, however, the picture changes. A Pew poll conducted last August showed:

    • 85 percent of people support background checks for purchases at gun shows and in private sales.

    • 79 percent support laws to prevent the mentally ill from buying guns.

    • 70 percent support a federal database to track gun sales.

    • 57 percent support a ban on assault weapons.

    “Congress can’t even pass mild, commonsense gun control legislation supported by vast majorities of Americans,” said Medea Benjamin, co-founder of the activist group CODEPINK, which recently staged a die-in at NRA headquarters in Fairfax, Virginia. “The stranglehold the NRA has on our elected officials is breathtaking, and its effects are devastating to our families and communities.”

    Big bucks for big guns

    Gun rights groups contributed $33,925 to U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson, who is running for re-election in Wisconsin against Democrat Russ Feingold.

    The No. 2 payout was to U.S. Sen. Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire, whose campaign has received $29,295 from gun rights groups, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

    Since the start of 2015, Senate Republicans have received $304,319 from gun rights groups. During that same period, Democrats have received $7,250.

  • Terror in the ‘Happiest Place on Earth’

    Terror in the ‘Happiest Place on Earth’

    An act of terror.

    An act of hate.

    The world responded with love and compassion, fury and fight.

    Early on the morning of June 12, a gunman armed with an assault rifle and a handgun went on a rampage at the gay nightclub Pulse in Orlando, Florida. He killed 49 people and wounded more than 50 others — some gravely.

    The 29-year-old killer was an American who pledged allegiance to the Islamic State, abused his wife, used slurs against blacks, Jewish people, women and gays — although he himself was a regular patron of Pulse. He went on to terrorize LGBT people in that place that existed to celebrate Pride and provide sanctuary.

    Orlando — famously known as the “Happiest Place on Earth” — became the site of the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history, a massacre that left Americans mourning the many lost and struggling to address extremism, prejudice and gun access.

    “I can’t stop crying. I can’t make any sense of it all,” said Henry Rivera of Orlando, a transgender man who works at a restaurant just outside Disney World. “Everything seems different now.”

    Music, dancing, and terror

    On June 11, more than 300 people crowded into the high-energy club on South Orange Avenue for Latin night, an evening that promised entertainment by two drag performers, as well as dancing and music — salsa, meringue, bachata.

    Shortly after 2 a.m. on June 12, Omar Mateen, armed with a semi-automatic rifle and a Glock handgun, attacked the club, according to reports from the Orlando Police Department and FBI. As WiG to press, authorities were still compiling a detailed and complete timeline of what happened at Pulse.

    Survivors described chaos as Mateen launched a barrage of bullets, striking people at the bar, on the dance floor, in the restrooms and elsewhere.

    An off-duty Orlando police officer working as a security guard at the club responded to the gunfire. More officers arrived and Mateen retreated deeper into the club, then into a bathroom.

    At 2:09 a.m., an alert was posted on Pulse’s Facebook page: “Everyone get out of Pulse and keep running.”

    Dozens of people ran from the club, and more than 100 police officers responded to what became a standoff.

    Police believe Mateen killed most of his victims in the first 30 minutes. Those remaining in the bar were either hostages or in hiding.

    At 2:39 a.m., Eddie Justice texted his mother from the bathroom in the club:

    “Call them mommy”

    “Now”

    “I’m still in the bathroom”

    “Hes coming”

    “Im going to die.”

    Justice did die. His last text from the club was at 2:50 a.m.

    At about 5 a.m., police used a controlled explosion and an armored vehicle with a battering ram to clear a way for people inside the club to escape.

    Mateen died in an exchange of gunfire with police shortly after that.

    Violent, conflicted and radicalized

    The killer talked with police three times during the standoff, FBI Director James B. Comey said in a televised news briefing from headquarters in Virginia on June 13. Comey said calls from the killer to law enforcement began about 2:30 a.m. During those calls, Mateen, who was born in New York, claimed allegiance to the leader of the Islamic State, as well as to the perpetrators of the 2013 Boston Marathon attack and to a Florida man who died as a suicide bomber in Syria.

    “These are strong indications of radicalization by this killer and of potential inspiration by foreign terrorism organizations,” Comey said.

    He added that the bureau, along with state and local law enforcement, were trying to understand “every moment of the killer’s path” leading up to the shooting.

    The FBI was already familiar with Mateen. In May 2013, the bureau began investigating him after co-workers said the contract security guard made inflammatory comments and claimed a family connection to al-Qaida. He was interviewed twice but the case was closed.

    Two months later, Mateen’s name came up as a casual acquaintance of a Florida man who blew himself up in Syria.

    “Our investigation turned up no ties of any consequence between the two of them,” Comey said. “We will continue to look forward in this investigation and backward. We will leave no stone unturned.”

    According to AP, the investigation found that Mateen, the son of an Afghan immigrant, was a bodybuilder who attended a mosque in Fort Pierce, Florida, and wanted to become a police officer.

    AP also reported questions were emerging about whether Mateen was conflicted about his sexuality. He allegedly cased Gay Days at Disney World about a week before the shooting and was seen regularly at Pulse. He apparently used gay dating apps as well.

    Mateen’s first wife, from whom he was divorced, has said he was abusive and suffered from mental illness. The killer’s father said Mateen expressed a hatred of gays, recently expressing anger at seeing two men kiss.

    Mateen’s father also made homophobic remarks to the press, saying that it was wrong for his son to shoot gay people because their punishment should come from God.

    “While the motive behind this crime remains unclear, our resolve to live openly and proudly remains undiminished. Now is a time for the whole nation to stand together against violence,” Rea Carey, the executive director of the National LGBTQ Task Force, said June 12.

    Chad Griffin, the president and CEO of the Human Rights Campaign, said, “This tragedy has occurred as our community celebrates Pride, and now more than ever we must come together as a nation to affirm that love conquers hate.”

    Memorials and mobilizing

    Vigils took place as early as June 12 and continued for days after the shooting.

    Many of the observances included a moment of silence and a reading of the victims’ names (see “The slain, next page). Many vigils ended with candleholders singing “Over the Rainbow.”

    Hundreds sang, “If happy little bluebirds fly/Beyond the rainbow, why, oh, why can’t I?” at the end of a vigil June 13 in Sarasota, Florida, the hometown of Edward Sotomayor Jr., who recently helped to organize the first LGBT cruise from Florida to Cuba. Sotomayor was shot while trying to get his boyfriend to safety.

    Many at the Sarasota vigil called the mass shooting a hate crime, and though there were demands for stricter gun control, the focus was on anti-LGBT violence.

    “This attack was with guns, but our people have been killed with knives and bombs and fists, too,” said Patricia Callahan of Lakeland, Florida. “We can’t forget.”

    Vigils took place across the country, at city halls and courthouses, plazas and parks, community centers and gay bars.

    “This unimaginable atrocity has not only robbed countless people of their loved ones, it has also stolen a sense of safety within the LGBTQ community,” said GLAAD president and CEO Sarah Kate Ellis.

    In New York City, many gathered outside the Stonewall Inn, considered the birthplace of the modern LGBT civil rights movement. There, they chanted, “No hate, no hate! More love, more love.”

    In Wisconsin, multiple vigils took place, including in Milwaukee, Madison, Racine and Appleton.

    There also were many memorials outside the United States. In Paris, U.S. and gay Pride flags flew at city hall and the Eiffel Tower was lit up like a rainbow.

    Heads of state sent letters of condolence and issued condemnations. Israeli President Reuven Rivlin said his country stands “shoulder to shoulder with our American brothers and sisters,” and Palestinian Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah called the shooting a “senseless act of terror and hate.”

    Afghanistan Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah urged “collective actions to end such attacks.”

    At the United Nations, High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein decried insufficient gun control in the United States and criticized the irresponsible pro-gun propagandizing in the country.

    ‘America’s rifle’

    Criticism also was leveled in the United States.

    The massacre is “a further reminder of how easy it is for someone to get their hands on a weapon that lets them shoot people in a school, or in a house of worship or in a movie theater or in a nightclub,” President Barack Obama said June 12, in remarks from the White House. “And we have to decide if that’s the kind of country we want to be.”

    Mateen was armed with the handgun and a Sig Sauer MCX semi-automatic rifle — marketed in the U.S. as a “modern sporting rifle.” He purchased it at the St. Lucie Shooting Center in Florida. Semi-automatic rifles also were used in mass shootings in Newtown, Connecticut; Aurora, Colorado; San Bernardino, California; and elsewhere. The NRA calls that weapon class “America’ rifle.”

    After the shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, the president dedicated the start of his second term to pushing legislation that would have banned certain assault-style weapons and capped the size of ammunition clips. The effort, however, failed in the U.S. Senate due to heavy opposition from Republicans who are backed by the National Rifle Association.

    In the years since, some reforms have taken place at the state level. But GOP-headed states, including Wisconsin, have enacted measures to weaken gun control laws.

    On June 13, Senate Democrats renewed calls for reform and Hillary Clinton, the Democrats’ presumptive nominee for president, repeated her call to keep weapons of war off the streets and “out of the hands of terrorists or other violent criminals.”

    Clinton and the president postponed a campaign visit to Green Bay scheduled for June 15, as the president made plans to visit Orlando on June 16 to “stand in solidarity with the community.”

    The slain

    As WiG went to press, these were the known dead in the Pulse terror attack:

    Stanley Almodovar III, 23; Amanda Alvear, 25; Oscar A. Aracena-Montero, 26; Rodolfo Ayala-Ayala, 33; Antonio Davon Brown, 29; Darryl Roman Burt II, 29; Angel L. Candelario-Padro, 28; Juan Chevez-Martinez, 25; Luis Daniel Conde, 39; Cory James Connell, 21; Tevin Eugene Crosby, 25; Deonka Deidra Drayton, 32; Simon Adrian Carrillo Fernandez, 31; Leroy Valentin Fernandez, 25; Mercedez Marisol Flores, 26; Peter O. Gonzalez-Cruz, 22; Juan Ramon Guerrero, 22; Paul Terrell Henry, 41; Frank Hernandez, 27; Javier Jorge-Reyes, 40; Jason Benjamin Josaphat, 19; Eddie Jamoldroy Justice, 30; Anthony Luis Laureanodisla, 25; Christopher Andrew Leinonen, 32; Alejandro Barrios Martinez, 21; Brenda Lee Marquez McCool, 49; Gilberto Ramon Silva Menendez, 25; Kimberly Morris, 37; Akyra Monet Murray, 18; Luis Omar Ocasio-Capo, 20; Geraldo A. Ortiz-Jimenez, 25; Eric Ivan Ortiz-Rivera, 36; Joel Rayon Paniagua, 32; Jean Carlos Mendez Perez, 35; Enrique L. Rios, Jr., 25; Jean C. Nives Rodriguez, 27; Xavier Emmanuel Serrano Rosado, 35; Christopher Joseph Sanfeliz, 24; Yilmary Rodriguez Solivan, 24; Edward Sotomayor Jr., 34; Shane Evan Tomlinson, 33; Martin Benitez Torres, 33; Jonathan Antonio Camuy Vega, 24; Juan P. Rivera Velazquez, 37; Luis S. Vielma, 22; Franky Jimmy Dejesus Velazquez, 50; Luis Daniel Wilson-Leon, 37; Jerald Arthur Wright, 31.

    Donations and support

    Equality Florida, the statewide LGBT civil rights group, established a GoFundMe page to raise money to support those injured and the families of those killed at Pulse. Donations are accepted at www.gofundme.com/pulsevictimsfund.

    The Associated Press contributed to these reports.

    For updates and continued coverage, go to www.wisconsingazette.com.

  • Island of seduction

    Island of seduction

    The way a kid feels that day before the last day of school before summer vacation? That’s the way Fire Island fans feel before the long Memorial Day weekend. The way a kid feels that day before the first day of the new school year? That’s the way Fire Island fans feel about Labor Day weekend.

    You can read it in the tweets city-dwellers broadcast before Memorial Day weekend – the longing messages about catching the ferry to Fire Island, slipping into flip-flops, soaking up some sun, welcoming summer.

    “Beach-bound, baby,” read one tweet.

    “I heart Fire Island,” read another.

    And then “Missed you. #FireIsland,” “Can’t wait to get to #FireIsland,” “Tingling thinking about #FireIslandPines,” “Escape to #FireIsland.”

    The barrier island is about 5.5 miles across Great South Bay from Long Island and reached mostly by ferry. In the 2010 U.S. Census, there were 292 permanent residents, but the population swells in the summer, especially on the weekends, when thousands step off the ferry and head for a favorite spot on the seashore, a rendezvous at the lighthouse, a room at the Belvedere, an underwear party at The Ice Palace, a drag show at Cherries on the Bay, a Blanche Devereaux cocktail at the Blue Whale or a slice of cheese and pepperoni at Cherry Grove Pizza.

    The island is a summer retreat from NYC for many. And it has long been a paradise for the gay community, particularly in Cherry Grove and the Pines.

    In late May, after thousands of LGBT activists marched on Manhattan streets to protest a series of hate crimes, including the fatal shooting of a gay man on May 18, the serene seashore and peaceful pines beckoned with refuge and recreation.

    Visitors on Memorial Day saw how much the island – largely through the Fire Island Revive campaign – has rebounded after Superstorm Sandy’s high tides and strong surge damaged buildings and washed away much of the shore in October 2012.

    Visitors also saw the progress at the muscular Pavilion nightclub, the legendary Fire Island Pines dance club destroyed by fire in November 2011 and rebuilt for “high tea,” cabaret, theater, art exhibits and weddings.

    “Although the new building has the same envelope and mix of uses as its predecessor, the similarities end there,” said developer Matthew Blesso of FIP Ventures. “The new structure is modern and casual, bold and iconic. It is the first thing visitors seen when getting off the ferry, and we envision it to once again be the heart of the Pines community.”

    The Pavilion’s resurrection comes as the Pines marks its 60th anniversary, which explains why the island’s summer calendar is so crowded with events.

    Examining the island’s past

    Two newly published books explore the history and the culture of the community.

    In “Fire Island Modernist: Horace Gifford and the Architecture of Seduction” from Metropolis Books, Christopher Bascom Rawlins writes how the overlooked gay architect’s beach houses transformed the landscape and the culture of Fire Island.

    Gifford grew up on the beaches of Florida and, in Rawlins’ telling, the architect’s deep connection to nature shows in the buildings he created for the shore just 50 minutes from the skyscrapers of New York.

    Rawlins was exploring the Pines – “an urban invention, possessing a rustic-chic aesthetic that only a city-dweller could conjure” – when he caught a glimpse of a seductive home through a tangle of holly trees, then saw another intriguing home and another.

    He began knocking on doors to inquire about the architect and, in each case, was told the designer was Gifford. Soon Rawlins rented what turned out to be Gifford’s residence and delved into a study of the architect’s life and work, which were so evocative of the Stonewall era – seductive, liberating, modern. The author describes seeing a slideshow of Gifford’s “ingenious homes flashed before me, tucked into lightly settled, utopian dunescapes. I was smitten, and determined to introduce this work to a broader public.”

    “Tom Bianchi: Fire Island Pines, Polaroids 1975-1983” from Damiani could serve as a companion to “Fire Island Modernist.” Bianchi photographs even appear in “Modernist” to strengthen the ties.

    Bianchi’s book – he provided the text and never-before published images, while Edmund White wrote the introduction – tells the story of sun, sex, camaraderie and reverie in the Pines.

    Bianchi first heard of Fire Island in the 1950s, when he purchased a 25-cent “physique” magazine at a newsstand in downtown Chicago that contained a photograph of bodybuilder Glenn Bishop on Fire Island. “Fire Island sounded exotic, perhaps a name made up by the photographer,” wrote Bianchi. “I had no idea it was a real place. Certainly I had no idea then that it was a place I would one day call home.”

    In 1970, Bianchi spent a weekend at Fire Island Pines, where he became a regular, got a beach house, found a community and made friends. He used an SX-70 Polaroid camera to lovingly celebrate the people – men mostly, bronzed and buff, in Speedos or faded Levi’s – in the Pines.

    The sunny Polaroids end in 1983, as HIV brought disaster. Bianchi boxed the photographs and stored them at his Palm Springs, Calif., home for decades. He said the Polaroids became a record of a lost time and a lost world too painful to visit.

    But when he opened the box years later, he found the lovers and friends, alive again, back on Fire Island.

  • Meanwhile in Mecca: an illustrated story of San Francisco

    Meanwhile in Mecca: an illustrated story of San Francisco

    The place “has always been a refuge for anyone to come to, whatever status in society. For people, intellectuals, pseudo-intellectuals, for lonely people. For every walk of life.”

    Wendy MacNaughton is referring to the San Francisco Public Library, maybe not a stop on every vacationer’s itinerary, but the population of the library “mirrors the population we have in SF” — from Arab-American to Vietnamese-American.

    People line up to enter before the library opens. It’s free, and inside there’s a cafe, a literacy center, an international center, a teen center, an environmental center, an arts center, and an unprecedented program for serving the homeless. Oh, and books.

    This generally is not the kind of information found in a tourism brochure from a chamber of commerce or visitors bureau. But it is the type of information found in Meanwhile in San Francisco: The City in Its Own Words from Chronicle Books.

    Meanwhile is graphic journalism, an illustrated, street-smart collection from MacNaughton, a New York Times-bestselling artist. Readers might have seen her work in the Times or the Wall Street Journal or her other book, The Essential Scratch and Sniff Guide to Becoming a Wine Expert.

    When Pride month comes around, we think of “Holy New York” and the Stonewall riots, but also of “Holy San Francisco,” where queer people from around the nation found something much more valuable than gold under that famous fog.

    How many of us already have been? But still we think of making a pilgrimage back to the bay.

    And we keep it in our hearts through literature.

    MacNaughton’s book, at just 176 pages and fully illustrated, is as delightful as a sunny afternoon on the Presidio. “The drawings are mine, but the words came from people living and working in San Francisco,” she says.

    She spent hours getting to know the drivers and the passengers on MUNI, studying Giants fans, visiting with the game players of Chinatown, figuring out the character of the lower Haight and the upper Haight, and appreciating the hard work of the vendors at the San Francisco Civic Center farmer’s market. Tourists might browse the market in 10 minutes, but for the vendors, the day begins as early as 2 a.m.

    Visitors might have heard about the great bison of the great Golden Gate Park, which first arrived in 1890, or thereabouts. Well, MacNaughton, in just two pages, introduces them with affection and humor, including “Unnamed Cow” or “UC” for short, who was a gift from Diane Feinstein’s husband about 30 years ago.

    The bison’s daily routine: “Graze, ruminate, eat grain, graze, sleep, retreat.”

    There is a map to Dolores Park at the western edge of the Mission District, useful for a visitor who wants to know the “cruising area” or the visitor who wants to avoid the bushes. The “truffle guy” is marked on the map, as is a “naked guy nearly,” “gay beach lite” and “lesbians — butch, femme, young, old, all checking out the endless line for the bathroom.”

    The book is not intended as a comprehensive portrayal of San Francisco. MacNaughton says, “It’s only a small handful of the huge number of communities to be found in The City, on every steep street, behind every gated door, in every grassy park. These are the stories of San Francisco daily life. This is what happens in the meanwhile.”

    The meanwhile, in our mecca.

  • From protest to preservation: | Federal government identifies historic LGBT sites and events

    On a warm night in June 1969, outside the Stonewall Inn, rioters rebelled against the continued persecution and harassment by government officials.

    On a sunny day in late May, government officers — the highest-ranking among them a member of the U.S. cabinet — gathered outside the unobtrusive brick building that stands as the symbolic birthplace of the modern gay civil rights movement to usher in LGBT Pride Month with a new initiative — a historic campaign to preserve and celebrate LGBT history.

    As part of the National Park Service Heritage Initiative, a task force will spend the next 12-18 months identifying places and events associated with the story of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Americans for inclusion in the parks programs.

    The study is part of a broader initiative under the Obama administration to ensure that the National Park Service tells a more complete story of the people and events responsible for building the nation.

    Interior Secretary Sally Jewell said she chose the Stonewall in New York’s Greenwich Village because it is the only LGBT-associated site designated a national historic landmark by the National Park Service as a property having extraordinary significance in American history.

    “We know that there are other sites, like Stonewall Inn, that have played important roles in our nation’s ongoing struggle for civil rights,” she said.

    The study will be a public-private partnership, with funding from the Gill Foundation through the National Park Foundation.

    “LGBT history is American history,” said Gill Foundation founder Tim Gill. “The contributions of LGBT people are part of the great American journey toward full equality, freedom and liberty for all our citizens.”

    The first meeting of scholars involved in the research took place in Washington, D.C., on June 10. Other meetings will take place over the next year.

    “The National Park Service has a responsibility to protect, preserve and tell the stories of some of our nation’s most iconic places, and as part of that responsibility, it is our job to be sure that Americans never forget where we’ve been, where we are and what we aspire to be as a nation,” said Jon B. Jarvis, director of the National Park Service. “I am excited to see how the outcomes of the LGBT Heritage Initiative and theme study will allow us to share a more inclusive version of our uniquely American experience.”

    With praise for the initiative, Clark Bunting of the National Parks Conservation Association said, “Our national parks belong to all of us — a fact that is particularly important as we look toward the Park Service’s centennial in 2016 and its next 100 years. As America’s storyteller, it is commendable and appropriate for the National Park Service to examine themes that incorporate the history and significant events of our diverse population.”

    Eliza Byard, the executive director of the nation’s largest LGBT education group, the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network, also applauded the announcement. She observed that laws banning schools from teaching anything positive about homosexuality remain on the books in eight states.

    “Symbolically, it’s hugely important that now LGBT history is officially part of the national narrative,” she said. “This is part of what our federal government will identify, preserve and single out.”

    In keeping with tradition, there was a demonstration at Stonewall the day of the announcement.

    Activists with the grassroots group GetEqual protested on Christopher Street under the banner “Don’t Stop at Our History — Full Federal Equality Now!”

    GetEqual has led the push for a presidential executive order banning federal contractors from discriminating based on sexual orientation and gender identity.

    “Across this country, in every single state, LGBTQ people suffer from the uncertainty created by the lack of legal protections,” said Felipe Sousa-Rodriguez, GetEQUAL co-director. “A study will bring light to what we already know — that discrimination against LGBTQ people has plagued our history since its inception. We have resisted inequality and oppression for hundreds of years to be able to live as our full, authentic selves. We need President Obama to create a clear vision and a clear roadmap to full LGBTQ equality under the law under his administration, and our time is running out.”

    On the register

    The National Register of Historic Places is the nation’s inventory of properties deemed central to its history and worthy of preservation. It includes more than 89,000 entries, more than 1.7 million individual buildings and sites representing local, state or nationally significant people, places and events.

    Just over 2,500 of these properties are national historic landmarks, designated by the secretary as representing the highest level of national significance.

    But relatively few of these properties can be identified as representing the stories associated with African-American, American Latinos, Asian Americans, Pacific Islanders, American Indians, Native Alaskans, Native Hawaiians or women. Currently, only four LGBT history-related properties are included in the National Register of Historic Places — the Dr. Franklin E. Kameny residence in Washington, D.C.; the Cherry Grove Community House and Theater on Fire Island in New York; the James Merrill House in Stonington, Connecticut, and the Carrington House on Fire Island.

  • In the game… WiG’s annual Pride pop quiz

    No doubt you know the words to “Go! You Packers! Go” and the name of that guy who wears No. 12 — maybe you know his career passing yards.

    And probably you know which Major League Baseball team is No. 1 in the National League’s Central Division and how many games are left until the All-Stars head for Minneapolis.

    But how do you score on WiG’s LGBTQuiz?

    1. True or False: Michael Sam, the first openly gay player in the NFL, recently signed a $2.65 million contract with the Chicago Bears.

    2. Which basketball player came out in a cover story in Sports Illustrated?

    3. She’s won 39 Grand Slam titles and received the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Her name is …

    4. He is the only male and the second diver in Olympic history to sweep the diving events in consecutive Olympic Games.

    5. This gay baseball player, who died of AIDS in 1995, is credited with inventing the high five when he played for the Dodgers.

    6. Her Twitter bio says, “Used to play tennis, now just talk about it on tennis channel. like to talk politics, though some would rather I stick to tennis :). No chance!!!”

    7. She had to go to court to play and, after transitioning, she competed in the U.S. Open.

    8. He played. He retired. He came out. Then he returned to the soccer field.

    P.S. Yes, we’re aware this would be more difficult without the photographs…

    Answers: 1. False, he signed with the St. Louis Rams. 2. Jason Collins, who played with the Nets in 2014. 3. Tennis legend Billie Jean King. 4. Greg Louganis. 5. Glenn Burke. 6. Martina Navratilova, considered by many in the sport to be the greatest female tennis player. 7. Tennis player Renee Richards. Paired with Betty and Stuart, Richards lost in doubles at the Open to Navratilova and Betty Stove. 8. Robbie Rogers, the first openly gay man to join Major League Soccer.

  • Legal limbo

    Legal limbo

    As gay couples in Wisconsin waited in legal limbo in mid-June, equality foes continued working to defend anti-gay amendments in the courts and marched on Washington.

    But those foes are caught in a losing streak. The march on Washington on June 19 fell flat, and there have been 21 consecutive court rulings for marriage equality since last summer, when the U.S. Supreme Court overturned a key provision in the anti-gay Defense of Marriage Act.

    On June 25, a federal judge struck down Indiana’s same-sex marriage ban as unconstitutional. The court clerk in Marion County, home to Indianapolis, began issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples about an hour after the decision was announced.

    On the same day, the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver upheld a lower-court ruling that found Utah’s prohibition of same-sex marriage unconstitutional. The 3-2 ruling affects all states in the 10th Circuit: Colorado, Kansas, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Utah and Wyoming.

    But the appeals court immediately put a stay on marriages in those states pending a U.S. Supreme Court ruling.

    Just weeks before the June 25 rulings,  U.S. District Judge Barbara Crabb on June 6 found that Wisconsin’s constitutional amendment barring gay couples from marrying violates the 14th Amendment’s Due Process and Equal Protection clauses. Crabb didn’t issue a stay — requested before her ruling by Republican Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen — until June 13. So for six days in early June, same-sex couples applied for and obtained marriage licenses in 60 of the state’s 72 counties. At least 550 gay couples were married in Wisconsin.

    While the case is pending appeal with the 7th Circuit in Chicago, there’s uncertainty: For those with licenses who didn’t marry, should they wed? For those caught in the five-day waiting period, can they marry in another state? For those who married, what benefits, responsibilities or protections do they have?

    “I think the harder questions are like adoptions, the really hard issues,” said Carl Tobias, a professor at the University of Richmond School of Law. That’s why these stays are so gut-wrenching for people.”

    On June 16, Wisconsin’s congressional Democrats asked U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder to confirm, as he has done in similar situations in Utah and Michigan, that the federal government will recognize the marriages of Wisconsin gay couples and guarantee them:

    • The ability to sponsor a foreign spouse for legal residency.

    • Health, workers’ compensation, retirement and other benefits for the spouse of a federal employee.

    • Health benefits, spousal ID cards, housing allowances and on-base support services for the spouse of a military servicemember.

    • Joint income tax filings, as well as spousal exemptions of gifts, inheritances and the value of employer-provided spousal health coverage.

    • Unpaid family and medical leave to care for an ill spouse.

    • Spousal Social Security benefits.

    “Earlier this year, you made clear that couples who married in Utah and Michigan after federal judges struck down those states’ bans are entitled to full federal recognition,” the lawmakers wrote. “We are grateful for this tremendous leadership on behalf of fairness and equality. We ask that you similarly declare that those same-sex couples who married in Wisconsin since the June 6 decision are equally entitled to the federal benefits they deserve.”

    Meanwhile, the American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of Wisconsin, which filed the equality case on behalf of eight same-sex couples, was assessing the situation — preparing for the appeal and looking into whether additional lawsuits should be filed on behalf of couples left in limbo.

    In addition to the June 25 rulings, another marriage equality case was set for June 26 in Louisiana and a hearing was set for July 2 in a Florida case.

    And the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals will hear five cases from four states — Ohio, Michigan, Kentucky and Tennessee — in a single session in Cincinnati on Aug. 6.

    The Cincinnati court is the third federal appeals court to weigh recent challenges to state bans. The 4th Circuit in Virginia heard arguments in another case in May.

    Any one of them, or all, could reach the U.S. Supreme Court and bring a conclusive ruling on marriage equality.

    ‘A hateful handful’

    Leaders on the equality side fully expect the nine-member Court to eventually overturn the amendments and anti-gay marriage laws.

    And so do many leaders in conservative circles — from Newt Gingrich, who was House speaker when DOMA was enacted, to seven-term U.S. Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah. In May, Hatch told a radio interviewer, “Let’s face it: Anybody who does not believe that gay marriage is going to be the law of the land just hasn’t been observing what’s going on.”

    Yet groups such as the National Organization for Marriage and the Family Research Council pledge to fight on for years against gay marriage the way the anti-choice movement has fought Roe v. Wade.

    NOM promoted the June 19 march as a “road to victory.”

    Co-sponsors of the event included FRC, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Philadelphia, the Washington Times newspaper, the Alliance Defending Freedom, Concerned Women for America and the Heritage Foundation.

    Speakers included what the Human Rights Campaign described as a “parade of horribles” — former U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, Catholic Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone, NOM president Brian Brown, Capital Tea Party Patriots co-founder Doug Mainwaring, a gay man who says gay marriage is “objective evil,” and ADF counsel Austin Nimocks.

    NOM also brought to the microphone Bishop Harry Jackson Jr., who has compared gay marriage to a satanic plot; Dr. Him Garlow, who has said gay marriage will lead to enslavement of those opposed to the unions; Heritage Foundation fellow Ryan Anderson, who has compared gays and lesbians to pedophiles; and the Rev. Bill Owens Sr., who has likened gay marriage to bestiality.

    Brown, in a statement to supporters before the march, claimed the Supreme Court “will be watching.”

    He also said, “A competition is won by those who take the field, not by those who sit on the sidelines. Friends, we need to take the field for marriage — and fight to win.”

    NOM’s critics, however, maintain the organization is now faking a movement — national polls show that strong opposition to marriage equality has dropped to 28 percent and only 40 percent of opponents of marriage equality would pay anything to stop its progress.

    The march proponents “are the proud leaders of a hateful handful, the last gasp of a reactionary rump,” said HRC’s Fred Sainz.

  • We can be heroes: In pursuit of equality in the courts

    Eight same-sex couples — with a team of lawyers — committed earlier this year to overturn Wisconsin’s constitutional amendment barring gays and lesbians from the freedom to marry in the state. Their fight continues, but already their pursuit of equality has resulted in the marriages of at least 555 same-sex couples in Wisconsin.

    “These families simply want the security and recognition that only marriage provides,” Larry Dupuis, legal director of the ACLU of Wisconsin, had said when he filed the equality case in Madison in February. “They have built their lives and raised children here. It is wrong for the state to treat these loving and committed couples as second-class citizens, and it is cruel to place them in a catch-22 where they can’t even travel elsewhere to obtain federal protections without their marriage being labeled a crime.”

    The couples’ attorneys, the state’s equal rights leaders and the gays and lesbians who hope to take marriage vows have heralded the couples — Charvonne Kemp and Marie Carlson, Judith Trampf and Katharina Heyning, Roy Badger and Garth Wangemann, Johannes Wallmann and Keith Borden, Salud Garcia and Pam Kleiss, Kami Young and Karina Willes, Bill Hurtubise and Dean Palmer — as heroes.

    “To be a plaintiff in a case like this, you have to put yourself out there and vow to see the fight through, maybe all the way to the Supreme Court,” said April Goodmann, a Waukesha resident who, when the case is settled for good, hopes to marry her longtime girlfriend. “These people are heroes, plain and simple. They are my heroes.”

    There are now hundreds of heroes serving as plaintiffs in more than 70 marriage equality cases pending in 31 states.

    And there’s a long history of heroes who, with the support of groups such as the ACLU and Lambda Legal, challenged laws and regulations, changing the lives of LGBT people in housing and schools, in the Armed Forces and on the job, at the marriage license bureau and in the privacy of their own bedrooms. Most of them have been plaintiffs, but some have been defendants.

    A look at just a handful of the many LGBT civil rights cases fought over the years and the legal activists involved in them:

    • Jamie Nabozny. For four years, Nabozny was subjected to anti-gay verbal and physical abuse by students at his school in Ashland, Wisconsin. Students urinated on him, pretended to rape him during class and, in one assault, kicked him so many times in the stomach that he required surgery. Nabozny sued the school district and won in a federal appeals court in Chicago, which said in 1996 that public schools are obligated to protect students from anti-gay abuse. Nabozny, represented by Lambda, also won back in Wisconsin, where a jury in 1996 also found school officials liable.

    • Richard G. Evans. Evans, an administrator in Denver, was the lead plaintiff in a lawsuit seeking to overturn Colorado’s Amendment 2, enacted by voters in 1992. The amendment barred governments in the state from enacting non-discrimination ordinances or policies that would protect gays. The state argued that Amendment 2 simply prohibited creating “special rights” for gays, but Evans et al., represented by the ACLU and Lambda Legal, argued the measure denied gays the right to participate in the political process. The U.S. Supreme Court, ruling in 1996, said the amendment did not satisfy the Equal Protection Clause. The majority opinion said, “The resulting disqualification of a class of persons from the right to seek specific protection from the law is unprecedented in our jurisprudence.”

    • John Geddes Lawrence and Tyron Garner. On Sept. 17, 1998, deputies in Harris County, Texas, were dispatched to an apartment expecting to deal with a “black male going crazy with a gun.” It was a false claim, called in to the police by a jealous man. At the apartment, two deputies said they saw Lawrence and Garner engaged in sexual activity. They arrested the men for “deviate sex.” The two pleaded no contest before a justice of the peace, then appealed in Texas Criminal Court. Their case, managed by Lambda Legal, reached the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled in 2003 that sexual relationships between consenting adults are protected by the 14th Amendment.

    • Ninia Baerhr and Genora Dancel. The women became the lead plaintiffs in Baehr v. Miike, the landmark lawsuit seeking the freedom to marry in Hawaii in the 1990s. Though state lawmakers and voters erected barriers to the plaintiffs securing that right in the 1990s, their case launched the marriage equality movement and resulted, way back in 1993, in the first high court ruling for gay marriage. Today, Hawaii is an equality state.

    • Edith Windsor. Windsor is the widow of Thea Clary Spyer and the executor of Spyer’s estate. The women married in Canada in 2007, two years before Spyer’s death, and their marriage was legal in the state of New York. But until last summer, the marriage was not recognized by the federal government, which imposed $363,000 in taxes on the estate left to Windsor. Windsor’s lawsuit, brought by the ACLU, resulted in the U.S. Supreme Court overturning Section 3 in the Defense of Marriage Act and the full federal recognition of gay marriages.

    • Miguel Brashi. Braschi and Leslie Blanchard lived together for 10 years in a rent-controlled apartment in New York City, beginning in 1975. When Blanchard died in September 1986, the landlord threatened to evict Braschi, maintaining that he had no right to stay because Blanchard was the tenant of record. The 1989 case, Braschi v. Stahl, led the court to expand the definition of family in the city’s rent control regulations. The majority opinion said that protection against eviction “should not rest on fictitious legal distinctions or genetic history, but instead should find its foundation in the reality of family life.”