I just got back from the White House, where I went to see Obama speak about his signing the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act Act, which expands federal oversight of hate crimes to include sexual orientation and gender identity. It was rolled into the defense authorization bill. A couple of reactions:
1) I wrote earlier disagreeing some complaints in the LGBT community that the Matthew Shepard Act wasn't done as a stand-alone bill. The funny thing about progress is, when it's all said and done, no one cares. None of the folks I spoke to at the reception cared one whit about the defense bill- they were simply happy to have gotten to this day after 13 years of working for it. It relates a bit back to what I say about how much voters care about bipartisanship- no one could tell you the vote count on Social Security (an extremely partisan vote). All they can tell you is that they like the result. In other words, policy matters more than process- even to the most die-hard activists.
2) Obama quoted LBJ upon his signature of Civil Rights Act of 1968- "Through this law the bells of freedom will ring a little louder". Very moving and very true.
3) I guess the "HRC hasn't accomplished anything!!" meme can officially die now, even to the most ardent critics. HRC has worked closely with the Shepard family, reached out to the family of James Byrd, Jr., and worked for years to round up the votes. Lots of people and organizations, including Cathy Renna, who originally did the press around the Shepard murder, and GLAAD, deserve congratulations, but HRC deserves a huge slap on the back.
4) I have something of a working theory on how much LGBT individuals who live in places where you rarely see hate crimes- liberal urban areas like where I live, for example- will care about this getting done. Or how much those who work in environments where they don't live under the fear of being fired for coming out will appreciate ENDA when it's done. To some of my friends here, hate crimes is small-ball. One friend even called the Matthew Shepard Act "soooo 1996". To them, they care a little bit for people who live in constant fear of harassment or violence, but care more about DOMA and DADT being repealed- something that affects them more directly. I'll be interested to see if the reactions of the LGBT community at large are the same.
First, the good news. On Thursday the Matthew Shepard Act passed the Senate with a 60 vote (filibuster proof) majority. Every Democrat voted in favor of the legislation, as did both independents and nine Republicans: Coleman (MN), Collins (ME), Gregg (NH), Lugar (IN), Smith (OR), Snowe (ME), Specter (PA), Voinovich (OH), and Warner (VA). In case you were wondering, that means Craig (ID) voted no, like he always does when it comes to legislation that would protect him gay people. No word yet on whether Bush plans a veto. Additionally, ENDA is poised to pass the House for the first time in the 30 years since its introduction.
Unfortunately, there is also some not-so-good news. This year transgender inclusive language was added to ENDA. Yesterday the gender identity provision was dropped to ensure passage of the bill, a move that was opposed by all the major gay rights organizations. Barney Franks issued a statement explaining the decision. It's very long, but I've excerpted some relevant sections:
"We are on the verge of an historic victory that supporters of civil rights have been working on for more than thirty years: the passage for the first time in American history by either house of Congress of legislation declaring it illegal to discriminate against people in employment based on their sexual orientation. Detracting from the sense of celebration many of us feel about that is regret that under the current political situation, we do not have sufficient support in the House to include in that bill explicit protection for people who are transgender. The question facing us - the LGBT community and the tens of millions of others who are active supporters of our fight against prejudice - is whether we should pass up the chance to adopt a very good bill because it has one major gap. I believe that it would be a grave error to let this opportunity to pass a sexual orientation nondiscrimination bill go forward, not simply because it is one of the most important advances we'll have made in securing civil rights for Americans in decades, but because moving forward on this bill now will also better serve the ultimate goal of including people who are transgender than simply accepting total defeat today.
… "Leaders in the GLBT community, who strongly support the inclusion of transgender, now acknowledge that this would be the case - namely that the transgender provision would lose - so their proposed alternative was simply to withhold the bill from the House altogether.
"That is, their recommendation was that the Speaker simply announce that she was not going to allow the Employment Non-Discrimination Act to come up at all. I believe that would be a disaster - politically, morally, and strategically. While their reason for this would be the debate over how ultimately to achieve transgender inclusion, the impression that would be given to the country was that Speaker Pelosi, the first Democratic Speaker in thirteen years, and a lifelong strong supporter of LGBT rights, had decided that we could not go forward on what had been the major single legislative goal of gay and lesbian people for over thirty years.
…
"First, I would note that since I first became a legislator thirty-five years ago, I have spent a lot of time and energy helping enact legislation to protect a variety of groups from discrimination. In no case has any of those bills ever covered everybody or everything. Antidiscrimination legislation is always partial. It improves coverage either to some group or some subject matter, but never achieves everything at once. And insistence on achieving everything at once would be a prescription for achieving nothing ever.
I'm enough of a pragmatist to see Frank's point, but I still don't feel like celebrating. In my little (younger, urban, predominately lesbian) corner of the LGBT community, the distinctions being made in the bill don't really make a lot of sense. The boundaries between the lesbian community and transgender community (at least in my world) tend to be pretty fluid and in day-to-day life the distinction is not always salient. So it's hard to work up too much enthusiasm for a bill that will leave a lot of people out in the cold, and my sense is that those who remain unprotected will be those who are most vulnerable to being fired from their jobs in the first place. So thanks, but no thanks. Apparently Rep Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis) (the only other out LGBT member of Congress) feels the same, as she has dropped her co-sponsorship of the bill.
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