Private: Remembering Stonewall

by James C. Nelson, Justice, Montana Supreme Court (Retired)

Earlier this month, we celebrated the 70th anniversary of D-Day, the Allied landing in France at Normandy. There is a backstory to that event worth telling.

During World War II, the Nazi war machine utilized a ciphering device for encrypting secret messages called the Enigma machine. The German Navy and Army used these machines to control and report the locations of submarines in the Atlantic and to pass information about bombing raids, the movement of military units, and the location of cargo and military supply ships. Allied cargo convoys were decimated so successfully by German U Boats that Britain was in danger of being starved into surrender.

A number of British code breakers expended considerable effort to work out the vast permutations of the Enigma.  It fell, however, to one brilliant, young mathematician, Alan Turing, to create the computing device that cracked Enigma’s code. And, once the Enigma machines’ operations were compromised, the tide of war began to turn against Germany.  Indeed, Britain was able to successfully use the Enigma’s capabilities against Germany’s own Navy and Air Force.

In developing the code-breaking computer, Turing also developed the concepts of algorithms and computation—known as Turing Rules or Tests—upon which all modern computers, artificial intelligence and theoretical computation devices operate. 

Turing was also gay.  In the early 1950s, homosexuality was a crime in Britain.  In 1952, Turing was charged with “gross indecency” for having sex with a man.  Instead of being hailed as one of the crucial figures in defeating the Nazis, saving Britain and thousands of lives and securing a favorable conclusion to World War II for the Allies, Turing’s security clearance was revoked, he was barred from working for the British government and he was forced to be chemically castrated with huge injections of female hormones. Less than two years later, at age 41, Alan Turing committed suicide by eating a cyanide-laced apple.

Turing was recently granted, posthumously, a rare “mercy pardon” by Queen Elizabeth II.  But the fact is, homophobic discrimination was responsible for causing the untimely and tragic death of one of the greatest minds in modern history. Turing, the patriot, and the father of the computer science that drives the modern world, died because he was gay.

Like Turing, lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) Americans in the 1950s and 60s faced a similar legal system and society—although more homophobic than many other developed countries. Very few business establishments would serve, much less welcome, LGBT people. And, it was in this social context that the American gay rights movement was born on June 28, 1969 in New York with the Stonewall Riots—a series of spontaneous demonstrations by gay, lesbian, and transgender people in response to a police raid on a gay bar, the Stonewall Inn, in Greenwich Village.

To be sure, since Stonewall, LGBT people have fought hard for their civil rights. The gains made by this movement, especially in the last decade, are astounding. Indeed, there is gathering national support acknowledging that LGBT citizens are simply that—citizens—with the same rights, privileges and obligations as other citizens. Twenty federal courts have held that state marriage amendments and statutes that discriminate against LGBT people are unconstitutional as violating the Equal Protection Clause of the U.S. Constitution. A similar lawsuit has been filed in federal court in Montana, and that State’s shameful “marriage amendment,” Article XIII, Sec. 7, will, I predict, be the next to fall.

Yet, and in spite of these victories, there is a segment of society that remains dug in against LGBT citizens.  In Billings, Montana, those favoring the adoption of a nondiscrimination ordinance are having an uphill battle with the Christian right and some elected officials on the City Council. The Alliance Defending Freedom sent a spokesman that drew some 175 residents to hear why the Billings Council should vote down even allowing an NDO to be drafted. The spokesman’s two hours of remarks included that “We are putting people out of business and squelching their religious values because we don’t want anything interfering with anti-discrimination. . . .We are compelling people to use their talents in a way that violates their faith.”

In Texas, the State GOP proposed including in its party platform a “reparative” therapy plank: “Homosexuality must not be presented as an acceptable alternative lifestyle, in public policy, nor should family be redefined to include homosexual couples. We believe there should be no granting of special legal entitlements or creation of special status for homosexual behavior, regardless of state of origin. Additionally, we oppose any criminal or civil penalties against those who oppose homosexuality out of faith, conviction, or belief in traditional values. We recognize the legitimacy and value of counseling which offers reparative therapy and treatment to patients who are seeking escape from the homosexual lifestyle. No laws or executive orders shall be imposed to limit or restrict access to this type of therapy.”  Between 15 percent and 43 percent of LGBT people have been fired, denied promotions and have been subjected to workplace harassment, according to the Williams Institute. Over 50 percent of LGBT students are bullied and harassed in school; and those students are more than twice as likely to consider suicide, says the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. And the examples of bigotry and hate go on, and on—too numerous and too disgusting to detail further.

If we are to learn anything from Alan Turin and the hard-won victories since Stonewall it should be first, that sexual orientation and gender identity do not define a person’s character, courage, patriotism, intelligence or ability—any more than does race, ethnicity or gender; and, second, that discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity is a societal cancer that kills. It kills dignity and destroys self-esteem. It is a malignancy that demonizes many of our fellow citizens for simply being who they are. Homophobia kills people.

So, in this month when we recall D-Day, we should also take a moment to remember the brave Americans who demonstrated at the Stonewall Inn on June 28 and who kicked off the war for LGBT rights.  And when we tweet or send a text or an email, we might also send a silent thank you to Alan Turin—the brilliant gay mathematician, patriot, and computer scientist—who was harassed to death by his own government.

South Africa, led by Nelson Mandela, was the first country in the world to include in its Constitution a provision that prohibited discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. Fittingly, Mandela stated that: “…to be free is not merely to cast off one's chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others.”

And that is all lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people rightly demand—that the rest of us live in a way that respects and enhances their freedom; that they have the advantage and protection of the same Constitutional rights and laws that the rest of us citizens enjoy; that they no longer be the victims of shameful discrimination; that our Constitution’s guarantees of equal protection of the law and due process include them, as well as the rest of us, “We the People.”

The spirit of Stonewall lives on in the victories LGBT people have won; it will continue to endure through their defeats, and, ultimately, it will conquer discrimination and bigotry based on sexual orientation and gender identity. Nothing more; nothing less. Equality!  

LGBTQ Equality