September 25,1978 GAYSWEEK 8
Lesbians Sentenced in Murder Pact Outline Rules for
NEW YORK, September 6 (AP)-Two lesbians were given the equivalent of 30 years to life in separate prisons yesterday for arranging the murder-for-hire of the younger woman's husband to get his $100,000 insurance. "I was tried for gayety, not for murder," 29-year-old Carol Taylor told the court. "I was tried as a lesbian."
"I had the most disgusting, unfair trial anyone could get in a court," said the other defendant, blonde Elizabeth Taylor, when it came her turn to stand before
Justice Harold Hyman, the sentencing judge in State Supreme Court.
Hyman stipulated as part of his sentence that the two be placed in separate prisons so as to be kept apart. They are not related despite their identical last
names.
Hyman called Carol Taylor, the mother of two small sons, whose husband, Herbert, was the murder victim, "completely evil, a self-appointed executioner."
As for 40-year-old Elizabeth Taylor, mother of a teen-aged son and daughter, Hyman called her older and more experienced and said she took part in the murder to satisfy her own ends "both sexual and financial."
"It should have been you who should have calmed the turbulent waters Carol Taylor floundered in," the Judge added.
Following a mistrial last April, the two women were convicted June 7 of arranging a $10,000 contract for the murder of the 30-year-old Taylor, an employee of Consolidated Edison Co.
Taylor was shot to death March 14, 1976, in a Far Rockaway, Queens, bungalow where he lived alone after his wife left him to be with her female lover. His life was insured for $100,000.
The hired killer never was apprehended and no clue to his identity ever was made public, except for a report that a five-foot-eight man, black or Hispanic, of medium build and wearing a sloppy hat and dungarees, was seen running from the area of the bungalow after the shooting.
The state said the motives behind the murder were the "intensity of the lesbian relationship, the concern for the custody of the children, and the insurance. money."
The two women deserted their families to live together in Rosedale, Queens.
Stokes, Liberal, Opposes Murphy
NEW YORK, September 16-Tom Stokes announced today that he will wage "an aggressive, all-out campaign" to win the 17th Federal Congressional District seat now held by long-time incumbent John Murphy. Stokes is a supporter of the federal gay civil rights bill while Murphy opposes it.
Stokes lost the September 12 Democratic primary to Murphy but is the Liberal Party candidate. The 17th Congressional District comprises lower Manhattan, Greenwich Village, and all of Staten Island.
Stokes and two other candidates held Murphy to 47 percent of the primary vote. "For a 16-year incumbent to win less than half the vote in the primary of his own party is astonishing," said Stokes, who would up with 31 percent of the total. According to Stokes, this primary victory will be Murphy's "last hurrah." =
Orthodox Church Welcomes Gays
LOS ANGELES, August 1-At a recent meeting held in Los Angeles, the Patriarch of the North American Orthodox Catholic Church revised the Church Contitution to include the following statement: "We pledge to support human digity and not to exclude from these service any condition of mankind."
Registration
NEW YORK, September 18-According to state law, New York residents must
Study: 'Mama's Boys' Running the Country
WASHINGTON, DC, September 1 (ZNS)-A new book is alleging that most of America's presidents were "mama's
City Rights Law to register no later than October 14 in order boys."
Be Enforced
ANN ARBOR, MI, August 25 (Ann Arbor News)-Despite an attorney general's ruling to the contrary, City Attorney R. Bruce Laidlaw is sticking by the legality of Ann Arbor's human rights ordinance.
In an opinion issued Wednesday, Laidlaw disagreed with Attorney General Frank J. Kelley's finding last week that state law preempts local governmental units from enforcing civil rights laws. While the city may want to defer some matters to the Michigan Civil Rights Commission, Laidlaw said, "there does
not appear to be any more compelling reason to give up on local civil rights enforcement than there was when the City Council adopted its 1970 version" of its human rights law.
The original 1970 law was replaced earlier this year with a more comprehensive measure which, along with other human rights laws in Michigan cities, would be illegal if Kelley's opinion is adopted by state courts.
Laidlaw maintained that Kelley's most recent ruling ignores the strong home. rule provisions of the constitution which "have been construed as giving local governments ample power to regulate all matters which the local legislative body deems to be of local municipal concern."
Ann Arbor's human rights ordinance prohibits discrimination in housing, employment and public accommodations based on race, color, religion, national origin, sex, age, marital status, physical limitations, education association, sexual orientation, pregnancy, source of income. and family responsibilities.
It governs private business as well as labor union practices, and prohibits lending institutions and insurance companies from "redlining," meaning refusing to lend more or offer insurance to certain parts of the city.
Kelley's ruling was specifically directed to the legal status of the Wayne fair housing ordinance and activities of the Detroit Human Rights Commission.
Anti-Briggs Group Files Tax Suit
LOS ANGELES-The No on Briggs Committee is in the process of filing suit against the First Baptist Temple in Culver City to have its tax exempt status removed for allowing State Senator John
there.
to vote in the November 7 election.
New York Political Action Council member, Nick Bollman, stressing the importance for the lesbian and gay community to vote, said "If we want to have influence, we must be out there and
vote."
To be able to register, persons must be citizens of the US who reside in New York State and will be at least 18 years old by election day. Individuals must reregister if, since the last election, they have moved, changed their names, or changed their political party affiliation. Registration days in New York City are October 12 and October 14 from 1 pm
to
Writer Doris Faber has just written a work titled The President's Mother. Faber says her studies of the 38 women who mothered US presidents show the women were strong-willed and even. overpowering mothers, who instilled in their sons an unwavering and sometimes almost unhealthy desire for success.
According to Faber's study, the mothers were virtually always the principal influence in their sons' early lives. Presidential fathers are reported to have made almost no impression on the future chief executives during their sons' formative years.☐
by mail, individuals may contact the 9 pm at local polling places. To register More Women Moonlight Board of Elections in the county in which they live to obtain a form. This form must
be returned to the local Board of Elections before October 10.
For an absentee ballot, individuals may call or write the Board of Elections, giving them their permanent and tem-
porary addresses. The ballot must be in the hands of the Board of Elections by Election Day.
Tom Jones
California School Chief
Briggs to solicit funds during services Pat Donahue of the No on Briggs Opposes Proposition 6
Committee said that she and a companion attended the services and taped the political plea for funds. Rev. Turner, pastor of the First Baptist Temple, reportedly began his services by calling on the men in his congregation to come forth to the altar, kneel, and pray to God to save them from the temptation of sodomy. The services went "downhill from there," said Donahue.
Senator Briggs spoke saying that homosexuals had raised $5 million to sponsor an "Anti-6" television campaign. to begin in October. He said the campaign was being conducted by "normal" appearing people. Thereafter Briggs announced that he needed funds to combat this action, and asked the congregation for ten percent of the Church support. Rev. Turner suggested that the congregation write the name "Defend Our Children Fund" on offering envelopes which they wished to be passed on to this organiza-
tion.
Rev. Turner stated the church had already donated to Briggs's organization.
SACRAMENTO, CA, September 7 (AP)-State schools chief Wilson Riles said Wednesday he saw no need for Proposition 6, which is aimed at firing lesbian and gay teachers, those associating with them, and those said to be in any way advocating gay lifestyles (within the context of the classroom).
"We have enough laws on the books to protect the youngsters," Riles said of Proposition 6, the November ballot measure sponsored by State Senator John V. Briggs (R-Fullerton).
"I looked into the situation several months ago, before this proposition came up, and I don't see any need for it," Riles said.
"You go through the Education Code and it outlines the moral and other activities of teachers. Whether they are heterosexual or homosexual, they have no business indoctrinating their students. That is the issue. So to put another proposition before the people is not going to do anything but create divisiveness."
WASHINGTON, DC, September 6 (Wall Street Journal)-Women moonlighters are multiplying. According to a Labor Department survey taken in May, 3.3 percent of the nation's female workers held more than one job, up from 2 percent in May 1962. During the same 16 years, the proportion of male workers with more than one job declined from 6.4 percent to 5.8 percent.☐
Tom Jones at ProERA Fundraiser
PHILADELPHIA, September 12 (Inquirer)-His audiences may be made up of some of the most unliberated. women in the world, but nonetheless, singer Tom Jones performed last night at a fundraising benefit for the Equal Rights Amendment ratification fund.
Before he went on, Jones-to whom women in his audiences often toss roses, room keys and sometimes their panties-was asked what he might expect to fly in his direction last night.
"Pies," said the man who is still trying to live down a remark he made about career women a few years ago.
"I never said that all women belong in the home," said Jones, "I just said . . . I would not want to be married to a career woman because that would take up too much of her time away from me."
Jones was persuaded to perform by Midge Costanza, former presidential assistant for women's affairs.