MARCH 25, 1994 GAY PEOPLE'S CHRONICLE 3
Boyle would back a federal lesbian-gay civil rights bill
Continued from Page 1
recognition, but that does not translate into votes. That's where you start and then evolve into whether people know the candidates. The majority of people [our campaign had polled] last month don't know either of us. They don't know Hyatt any more than Mary Boyle. Now in our poll when they find out who I am and who he is they vote for me. My job to get out the word about why my
Mary Boyle
background and experience is unmatched by any candidate seeking this office, including the Republicans.
Is it more of a battle because he's been endorsed by the party?
Actually not. The party has a major challenge in front of us in Ohio this year: an entire slate of officeholders that have to be addressed and George Voinovich leading the Republican ticket, that's going to make a very tough challenge. I think that I have had tremendous support from the Democratic organization both locally and statewide in my other offices, but the fact that the structure hasn't endorsed me statewide does not mean the Democrats are not going to support me. Working men and women have been supportive that's how I was ever elected and that's what's going to happen here.
What are your thoughts on the statewide anti-gay initiative activity that is taking place?
They are part of a major national right wing agenda. The part that bothers me is that it toys with the critical concerns of particular constituencies as an organizing tool-it's happened on women's issues as well, and I have a political repulsion for this kind of approach for any kind of issue... my view is against this kind of limitation on civil rights, so I've always opposed it.
But I've always felt a good deal of anguish about people who because of their personal beliefs get tied up in this kind of
thing and then they get manipulated by political activists who want to use it as an organizing effort. On the other hand hopefully it will serve as a very strong organizing effort for supporters of gay and lesbian rights in the state. You wish you weren't having to organize under the gun but it will be important to do that.
This move is not something which I believe has any future. I just think that Americans and the people in Ohio are of the mind to allow people to live by their own choice and the way that they want to and are not threatened by gays and lesbians on the job or in their apartment building or in their neighborhood or anything else. Politically, I think I have a responsibility as a political leader to be able to communicate that.
If elected to the Senate, will you support the federal legislation to provide equal protections for gays and lesbians?
I first became involved in equal rights as it relates to gay men in Cleveland Heights before I ran for office where the issue [was] of housing discrimination... [My husband and I] worked on trying to make sure that the family definition law did not discriminate against gays or make any provisions that required special actions based on sexual orientation. And that's been part of my record from the very beginning.
So when I first ran for the legislature I was supported by the [gay] organization that was politically active at that time called the Eleanor Roosevelt Democratic Club. In the legislature I continued to work on equal housing opportunities... When I came up here as county commissioner, I worked on a number of issues that relate to equal opportunity that have included sexual orientation including the hiring practises and promotional practises of the county. We have updated our equal employment opportunity policies specifically and sexual orientation has been one of those categories not to be discriminated against.
So you'd support a federal measure? Yes. I think that in effect that's the way we have gone over the years in terms of equal opportunity. And that brings the power of the federal government's enforcement into the whole question of discrimination based on sexual orientation. So having the feds involved and having the law passed at the federal level would allow that to occur. Sometimes it doesn't mean that enforcement is any better; enforcement's another whole issue which has lots of problems in lots of ways.
Joel Hyatt is liberal, and expresses support of gay and AIDS issues. How do you distinguish yourself to lesbian and gay voters?
You should vote for me because I'm the best candidate for this office, because I bring background and experience to the office, and a record you can point to. I'd like to talk about AIDS as well, beContinued on next page
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