Former President and California Gov. Ronald Reagan would have been 103 today, Feb. 6. In honor of the man some gay Republicans consider a “friend” of the gay community, the Liberty Education Forum (LEF), the nonpartisan arm of Log Cabin Republicans, released a video using Reagan’s farewell to the nation upon leaving the presidency “to emphasize Reagan’s message of inclusion” and to recall “the Republican Party’s history of leadership on equality-related issues while reminding viewers,” as Reagan said, of “what it means to be an American.”
Gregory T. Angelo, Executive Director of the Liberty Education Forum, said:
I can think of no better ambassador to take our mission of fostering gay acceptance to conservatives and people of faith across the United States than President Reagan, and I can think of no better date to make a historic stand for equality than the anniversary of his birth. This video is proof that the passing of time has not diminished Reagan’s ability to connect with conservative America, and it’s the Liberty Education Forum’s mission to make sure it connects with as many conservatives as possible.
Indeed, the Log Cabin Club was formed as an outgrowth of the campaign to defeat the anti-gay Briggs Initiative in California in the late 1970s. As LCR notes, the Briggs Initiative might well have passed if not for the opposition of then-Gov. Ronald Reagan. LCR writes:
Long-time Democratic gay activist David Mixner met with Reagan in 1978 to personally lobby him on the Briggs initiative, recalling, “Never have I been treated more graciously by a human being. He turned opinion around and saved that election for us,” Mixner said. “We would have been in deep trouble. He just thought it was wrong and came out against it.”
As gay Republicans Against 8 Campaign Manager Scott Schmidt noted on his website, 30 years later, in 2008, Log Cabin Republicans reminded Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger of Reagan’s opposition to the Briggs Initiative and Schwarzenegger came out against the anti-gay Prop 8.
“Ronald Reagan is a conservative icon because of his efforts to spread freedom around the globe,” said Schmidt. “Conservatives need to remember that Ronald Reagan was opposed to taking away people’s rights. Were he still with us today, Ronald Reagan would be in good company with another Republican governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger.”
While grateful for his opposition to the Briggs Initiative, many others in the LGBT community (full disclosure: including me)—were outraged that Reagan let the AIDS epidemic explode because it was only hitting gays and other marginalized people. Sean Strub, author of the powerful new memoir Body Counts: A Memoir of Politics, Sex, AIDS, and Survival and founder of POZ magazine, called Reagan’s AIDS policies “an evil brew of malign neglect and cruel stigmatization. “
But LEF’s Angelo offers an alternative perspective:
“President Reagan is given an unfair shake by gay advocates whose ideologies blind them to truth. Much of the blowback on Reagan from the left is centered on his handling of the AIDS crisis in the 1980’s that confuses a lack of public statements on the issue with inaction — but in fact, Reagan both spoke and acted on AIDS a great deal. In 1986, he declared that AIDS ‘remains the highest public health priority of the Department of Health and Human Services,’ calling it a ‘top priority’ in that year’s budget. In total, Reagan spent 5.7 billion dollars in the fight against AIDS during his administration — at a time when hard science was still emerging and the medical community was racing to find answers itself.
The same advocates so fond of demonizing Reagan conveniently gloss over bold stands he took on behalf of the gay community on policy such as the Briggs Initiative — which Reagan opposed — which would have made it illegal for gay individuals to be teachers in California public schools. One could argue that Reagan’s opposition to Briggs is the reason the referendum overwhelmingly failed.
Friends, colleagues, and family members of the President have also stated on numerous occasions that their interactions with President Reagan on the AIDS issue and his thoughts on the gay community in general did not mesh with the negative portrayal his enemies have attempted to attach to his legacy. Not only was Reagan no enemy of the gay community, he was actually a friend.”
In 2004, when Karl Rove was busy getting President George W. Bush re-elected by creating anti-gay marriage initiatives in 11 critical states in response to the marriage victory in Massachusetts and pressure from marriage rights advocates in California, gay thinker Dale Carpenter wrote “Reagan and Gays: A Reassessment” in the Bay Area Reporter, reposted on Independent Gay Forum. Carpenter said that the truth about Reagan and gays was “more complicated” than the popular myths suggested:
Start with the notion that Reagan himself was anti-gay. Like most of us, Reagan reflected the prejudices of his times. Born in 1911, he grew up in a small-town world that misunderstood and feared homosexuality. He was 62 by the time homosexuality was removed from the official list of mental disorders. According to biographer Lou Cannon, Reagan shared the common view of his time that homosexuality was a sickness. He was not above telling jokes about gays.
Still, perhaps because he worked with gay actors in Hollywood and had gay friends, Reagan was relatively tolerant. Cannon notes that Reagan was “respectful of the privacy of others” and was “not the sort of person who bothers about what people do in their own bedrooms.” This attitude was consistent with Reagan’s larger philosophical commitment to individual liberty and limited government…..
Tolerance is not acceptance, however, and Reagan made it clear in speeches that he would not cross the line to the latter. Said Reagan during the 1980 presidential campaign: “My criticism is that [the gay movement] isn’t just asking for civil rights; it’s asking for recognition and acceptance of an alternative lifestyle which I do not believe society can condone, nor can I.”
Aside from his tolerant personal attitude, Reagan’s actual record on civil liberties for gays was surprisingly good. Cannon reports that Reagan was “repelled by the aggressive public crusades against homosexual life styles which became a staple of right wing politics in the late 1970s.”
Carpenter concluded:
It’s true that no pro-gay legislation, like an employment non-discrimination bill, made headway during the Reagan years. But anti-gay legislation also made little progress. Reagan often talked the talk of religious conservatism, but he did not often walk the walk.
His priorities were elsewhere: reviving the country’s morale, strengthening national defense to defeat the Soviet Union in the Cold War, limiting the growth of the federal government, and boosting the economy. At each of these, Reagan succeeded brilliantly. Gays, like all other Americans, continue to benefit from his legacy.
Watching the LEF video and listening to Reagan’s remarks, one wonders how Reagan might feel about the very right-leaning Republican Party of today—would he fit in? Or would he—like Ted Olson, Paul Singer, Ken Mehlman and so many other Establishment Republicans (and even non-Establishment types such as Ann Coulter and Andrew Breitbart)—come to believe that gay individuals have the right to pursue happiness just like any other America?
This is no idle intellectual matter as both anti-gay religious social conservatives and pro-equality Republican moderates and conservatives claim Reagan as an icon. And today, on Reagan’s birthday, as the national Republican Party struggles with outreach to minorities and California Republicans just want to win and more and more voters are becoming independent—it might be helpful to remember that gay Republicans are a consistent 21-23 percent of the gay vote.
Watch the video and ask yourself if you agree with gay Republicans and Ronald Reagan’s assessment about what it means to be an American?