Bill Clinton November 1997: Clinton adviser Richard Socarides marks the first time a sitting president addresses a gay rights group. (Changing perceptions).For me, the moment came at 8:52 P.M. on November November: see month. 8, 1997, when President Bill Clinton took to the podium podium In architecture, a pedestal on a large scale. It may be any of various elements that form the base of a structure, such as the platform forming the floor and substructure of a Classical temple, a low wall supporting columns, or the structurally or decoratively at the Grand Hyatt hotel in Washington, D.C., at the Human Rights Campaign's annual gala dinner. By doing so, he became the first president in history to address a gay and lesbian audience--to a thunderous thun·der·ous adj. 1. Producing thunder or a similar sound. 2. Loud and unrestrained in a way that suggests thunder: thunderous applause. standing ovation, no less. From my seat in the front row, I could tell this was a truly historic moment, but it had not been easy to get there. At the time I was on the White House staff, serving as the president's principal adviser on gay and lesbian civil rights issues. The combined debacles during the president's first term over gays in the military and the Defense of Marriage Act had left many advisers with no appetite to take on gay issues in the second term. I argued that the huge support the president had received from us in both elections, combined with his strong personal commitment to our civil rights, meant that he once again had to take action and speak out on our behalf, and he readily agreed. Among other things, the president would go on to appoint hundreds of highly qualified gays and lesbians to his administration and to issue an executive order banning discrimination based upon sexual orientation sexual orientation n. The direction of one's sexual interest toward members of the same, opposite, or both sexes, especially a direction seen to be dictated by physiologic rather than sociologic forces. in the federal civilian workforce, making the U.S. government the largest employer in the world to do so. But I think, more important, he made it OK to be gay in America, or at least made it a lot easier. He was the first president to consider us full citizens worthy of full inclusion in the political process. For me, his speech that November evening--much of which he wrote himself in the presidential limousine as we rode to the dinner--was the most symbolic embodiment em·bod·i·ment n. 1. The act of embodying or the state of being embodied. 2. One that embodies: "The flag is the embodiment, not of sentiment, but of history" of that. That night he said that one of the most important things he wanted to do was to show all Americans "that gays and lesbians are their fellow Americans in every sense of the word.... We have to broaden the imagination of America. We are redefining, in practical terms, the immutable IMMUTABLE. What cannot be removed, what is unchangeable. The laws of God being perfect, are immutable, but no human law can be so considered. ideals that have guided us from the beginning." Socarides served as special assistant to the president in 1997-1999. He is now vice president for corporate relations at AOL (A division of Time Warner, Inc., New York, NY, www.aol.com) The world's largest online information service with access to the Internet, e-mail, chat rooms and a variety of databases and services. Time Warner. |
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