page 2

Gay Peoples Chronicle

NATIONAL NEWS

NEWS...

BY

THURMOND SHOCKED

Jeff Levi, Executive Director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, tes tified before the Senate Judiciary Committee, urging the Senate to reject the nomination of Justice William Rehnquist as Chief Justice.

Pointing out that lesbians and gays are 10% of the population, Levi charged that, Rehnquist's record showed he "would...deny us our basic constitutional rights of

free speech, free association, and privacy simply because of who we are." Conservative Republican Senator Strom Thurmond of

South Carolina, who once applied an obscene homophobic epithet to Bayard Rustin, seemed shocked to hear that 10% of Americans are gay people and questioned the figure. He also asked Levi whether the NGLTF advocated "any kind of treatment...to make them normal, like other people."

Levi replied that "we consider ourselves to be quite normal, thank you. We just happen to be different from other people." Thurmond seemed bewildered by this response and continued to ask about the conversion of homosexuals "to be like other people in some way."

DANNEMEYER DEFEATED

On July 24 the U.S. House of Representatives turned back homophobic Congressman William Danneyer's attempt to weaken the District of

Colaced una inse

bill

the Washington city council and signed by Mayor Barry the bill outlawed the use of medical tests to determine risk status for AIDS. Dannemeyer tried to offer an amendment forbidding the D.C. government to expend any funds enforcing its provisions. The House voted on a procedural motion that prevented his introducing the amendment. A roll-call vote, demanded by Dannemeyer, was 241-173.

This marks the House's first vote on an explicitly

SODOMY

KEPT

The Missouri Supreme Court by a 5-2 vote has upheld a state law forbidding gay and lesbian sex. Unlike most sodomy laws, this measure is directed specifically at gay people, forbidding any sexual activity involving contact between genitals and hand, mouth, or anus, but only among adults of the same gender.

Arguing that the state has a constitutional right "of implementing and promoting the public morality," the Court also found these practices a menace to public health if engaged in by gays and lesbians. Citing no medical authorities, they instead referred to "work" by the discredited homophobe Paul Cameron, who has been condemned by the American Psychological Association, the Psychological Association of his home state_(Nebraska), the American Sociological Association, and the Midwest Sociological Society.

gay issue since 1981, when it overturned the District's repeal of its sodomy law. Vic Basile of the Human Rights Campaign Fund hailed the vote as a major victory for gay rights. Pointing out its importance, NGLTF Executive Director Jeff Levi said, "We should be holding accountable our representatives for the positions they took."

Cleveland-area representaives Eckart, Feighan, Oakar, Seiberli and Stokes voted pallen Jannemeyer.

The Senate, however passed by a vote of 53 to 41 a similar amendment offered by homophobic senator Jesse Helms. It will not take effect unless also passed by the House.

Jeff

Levi

September 1986

: Casmir Kuczynski

HAY SCOLDED

The Gay Community News reports that long-time activ1st Harry Hay was barred from wearing a sign supporting the North American ManBoy Love Association at the Los Angeles Gay Pride Parade June 22. Christopher Street West, which runs the parade, has banned NAMBLA from participating.

Reading that_CSW had also barred Valerie Terrigno from marching (which it denies), Hay wore a pillow-case whose front bore the legend Valerie Terrigno Walks With Me. As a counterpart for the back he chose NAMBLA Walks With Me.

When Hay refused to remove the sign, a CSW official called on the West Holywood sheriff's posse to remove him from the parade. The Radical Faeries with whom Hay was marching began screaming. One Faerie, panicing, tore up the sign, ending the incident.

ATLAS FALLS

Atlas Savings and Loan, the gay-owned and operated financial institution in San Francisco founded in 1981, has been put out of business. Describing its death, the Bay Area Reporter blames the federal government.

Prosperous in its early years, Atlas ran into prob lems after a number of bad loans to real estate developers.

Without telling the Atlas management, the Federal Home Loan Bank Board placed Atlas in receivership and arranged a takeover by Empire of America Federal Savings Bank, based on Buffalo, N.P. The move took everyone asso-

A PIECE OF THE ROCK

Rumors that Rock Hudson had left his estate to fund

the battle against AIDS are untrue. The Bay Area Reporter says Hudson's $8,500,000 estate goes to the unnamed beneficiaries of a secret trust fund established in

1974.

Hudson's adopted sister has filed suit, charging that a gay conspiracy influ enced Hudson "away from family relationships and into a lifestyle which was contrary to [his] traditional and previous upbringing."

CURRAN PURGED

Washington

Archbishop James A. Hickey (who formerly headed the Cleveland diocese) has forbidden the Rev. Charles E. Curran to teach Roman Catholic theology at Catholic University. He charged Father Curran with what the Church teaches," "repeated refusal to accept although the points at issue involve sexuality rather than doctrine.

Father Curran has drawn the anger of conservatives by suggesting that the Church should not absolutely oppose contraception, divorce, abortion, and homo-

sexuality.

In a memo clarifying his position, Fr. Curran wrote, "...for an irreversible, constitutional or genuine homosexual, homosexual acts in the context of a loving relationship striving for permanency can in a certain sense be objectively morally acceptable [even though] homosexual relationships fall short of the full meaning of human sexuality."

Unnamed Vatican sources told the New York Times that the move against Fr. Curran was an attempt to extend the concept of infallibility from doctrine to sexuality, and to stifle dissent.

ciated with prise.

Atlas by sur-

While Atlas depositors are insured against loss, its stockholders will receive no compensation. The BAR points out that many of them bought stock to support a gay enterprise.

In an angry editorial describing the symbolic and practical value of Atlas to the gay community, the BAR said, "Our community has been slapped again by a vicious minded, greedy federal administration openly committed to enriching a few at the expense of many." It urged gay depositors to fight back by withdrawing their funds.

LUTHERAN STUDY: WELCOME GAYS

A study prepared for the Executive Council of the Lutheran Church in America concludes that the church can "neither absolutely condemn, nor ignore, nor praise and affirm homosexuality." It suggests that "many more of our congregations can extend a welcome, withhold judgement and offer pastoral support" to homosexuals.

The study notes that "in both contemporary biological and psychological research the emerging concensus is that homosexual orientation is a given rather than a choice. Even to admit the probability of this tendency makes it inappropriate to isolate homosexual orientation as a sin."

It also condemns use of the Bible to "bludgeon gay and lesbian people or exclude them from full fellowship within the community of the baptized" and points out that close study of the Biblical texts in question "leads to anything but clear and absolute directions."