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GAY PEOPLE'S CHRONICLE
October 21, 2011
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www.GayPeoplesChronicle.com
Paula Ettlebrick, who fought many battles, has lost one
by Anthony Glassman
New York City-After winning countless battles on behalf of LGBT equality over the last quarter of a century, Paula Ettelbrick lost her year-long fight with cancer on October 7. She turned 56 five days earlier.
She served for five years at the legal director at the Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund, from 1988 to 1993, then spent another half a decade as the legal counsel for the Empire State Pride Agenda.
She worked for the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force at its Policy Institute before becoming the executive director of the International Gay and Lesbian Rights Commission in 2003. She then became the executive director of New York's Stonewall Community Foundation and taught law at New York University.
She is survived by her partner, Marianne Haggerty, and two children with her former partner Suzanne Goldberg, Adam and Julia, 14 and 12 years old respectively. She is also survived by her two siblings, Robert
Ettelbrick and Linda Anderes.
"I will truly miss Paula-her sass, her smarts and her smile," said Rea Carey, executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force. "She was supportive of me and of other women in leadership positions. In fact, upon becoming the executive director of the Task Force, I received a note card from her along with a contribution to the Task Force in honor of women's leadership, telling me the story of how when she had become an executive director, another woman executive director had done the same for her."
"I have continued this tradition by sending a note to some new women executive directors, telling Paula's story and writing a check to their organization," she continued. "I know the tradition and her story will live on."
"Paula was a pioneering lawyer and dedicated leader in our movement," Joe Solmonese, the president of the Human
Paula Ettelbrick
Rights Campaign, said. "We mourn the loss of a tremendous force in the LGBT community and honor her unrivaled commitment to the full equality of all people."
"Our thoughts and prayers are with her family and friends," he concluded.
Kevin Cathcart, the executive director of Lambda Legal, said she was "a woman who never stopped fighting for social justice. When Paula Ettelbrick came to Lambda Legal 25 years ago to fight for the rights of gay men and lesbians, it took not only vision and a passion for justice-it also took courage to stand up in court and in the public eye during that earlier time in our history. Paula was fearless.”
"She was among a generation of lawyers, feminists and activists that helped to shape our movement," Cathcart continued. "At Lambda Legal, she fought for the rights of lesbian and gay parents and lesbian and gay students, and helped to shape the strategy that eventually overturned sodomy laws."
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State releases names of anti-gay petition signers
by Anthony Glassman
Olympia, Wash.-The state of Washington has released the names on a petition that forced a repeal vote on a statewide domestic partnership law, after a federal judge ruled that they are not exempt from public records laws.
U.S. District Judge Benjamin Settle ruled October 17 against Protect Marriage Washington, the group behind an unsuccessful 2009 attempt to rescind the state's domestic partner law. They claimed that revealing the names would expose the signers to harassment.
A day later, the state distributed DVDs to news organizations containing the 137,500 names of people who signed the petitions. Protect Marriage had filed a suit against the Public Records Act provisions requiring the release of the names after Brian Murphy, a gay civil rights advocate, said that he would put the names on two websites that were used to post the names of people who had signed other anti-gay petitions. In some instances, the names were used to spot local businesspeople in various states who were then subject to boycotts; in other cases, people found out that they had been duped into signing petitions under false pretenses. Protect Marriage listed many of their
plaintiffs as "John Doe" to "protect" them from harassment. Settle named them all in his ruling, after the case was sent back to him by the U.S. Supreme Court. Included among them were Ken Hutcherson, the pastor of Antioch Baptist Church, and State Sen. Val Stevens.
“While plaintiffs have not shown serious and widespread threats, harassment, or reprisals against the signers of R-71 [the repeal measure], or even that such activity would be reasonably likely to occur upon the publication of their names and contact information, they have developed substantial evidence that the public advocacy of traditional marriage as the exclusive definition of marriage, or the expansion of rights for same sex partners, has engendered hostility in this state, and risen to violence elsewhere, against some who have engaged in that advocacy," Settle wrote.
"This should concern every citizen and deserves the full attention of law enforcement when the line gets crossed and an advocate becomes the victim of a crime or is subject to a genuine threat of violence," he continues in his ruling. "The right of individuals to speak openly and associate with others who share common views with-
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out justified fear of harm is at the very foundation of preserving a free and open society."
"The facts before the court in this case, however, do not rise to the level of demonstrating that a reasonable probability of threats, harassment, or reprisals exists as to the signers of R-71, now nearly two years after R-71 was submitted to the voters in Washington State," he concludes.
To an extent, Protect Marriage shot them-
Kameny
continued from page 1
LGBT event or White House meeting was complete without Frank," said National Gay and Lesbian Task Force executive director Rea Carey. "I always appreciated that he gave the 50-plus-year perspective, the long view. While so many have been impatient about the pace of progress, there was Frank, insisting we recognize that, in the last two years, he was regularly invited as a guest of honot by the very government that fired him simply for being gay. Yet, he never slowed
selves in the foot in this case-without the names being released, they had no actual evidence of harassment against signers, while releasing the names would have made their claims moot.
It is another loss in this battle for anti-gay groups, often led by the National Organization for Marriage, who have refused to reveal their donors in a number of state antigay campaigns, although courts have ruled against them.
down in demanding what should be, showing us what was possible and pushing for the very equality and liberation we are still fighting for."
"As the history books are written on the LGBT movement, no doubt Frank's life will serve as an inspiration to those who will never have the honor of meeting him, but who embody the very future he knew would come true one day," she concluded, ending with a phrase Kameny coined. "Indeed, Frank, gay is good."
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