SALON

Wednesday, Nov 7, 2012 8:30 PM UTC

Barney Frank: “Within 10 years, we will have won this fight”

After Tammy Baldwin becomes the first openly gay senator, Rep. Barney Frank reflects on the future of LGBT

By

Topics: Maryland, Marriage equality, Election 2012, LGBT Rights, Maine, Tammy Baldwin, Barney Frank, LGBT, Gay marraige,

Barney Frank: (Credit: AP/Stephan Savoia/Ted S. Warren/Salon)

Last night was a huge win for LGBT activists. Marriage equality passed by referendum for the first time in American history in Maine, Maryland and Washington, while Minnesota rejected a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage, and Democrat Tammy Baldwin will become the Senate’s first openly gay member after winning a close race in Wisconsin.

Salon spoke with Rep. Barney Frank, the first openly gay member of Congress, to get his reaction to the news and thoughts on the future of the equality fight. This conversation has been lightly edited for brevity.

A big night, what was your immediate reaction?

I was very happy. I expected good news, but wasn’t planning on perfect news. By the way, in addition to Tammy’s win, which is big, and the referenda, we have several new openly gay members of Congress. Mark Takano in California; Sean Maloney in Westchester County in New York; Mark Pocan replacing Tammy, so that’ll mean at least five [openly gay] representatives. It’s a significant increase. And then to win all four of the referenda? It was very good news.

I think what it shows is that reality beats prejudice. When you’re fighting against discrimination, you’re in a kind of a vicious cycle. People are prejudiced so you can’t change the law, and because you can’t change the law, there’s no way to break the prejudice. In other words, people are told same-sex marriage will cause all these terrible problems. Once you have same-sex marriage, it’s very clear it causes zero problems. So trying to break out of that cycle is important. But we’ve now, I think, reached critical mass to break out of that cycle. That is, there are now enough places — because I think California is going to be added to that list fairly soon — so that now tens of millions of Americans now live in places where you have same-sex marriages. It’s just going to make it impossible for people to tell others it’s going to cause problems. So, it’s important in and of itself, but also as a sign that we’re on the verge of winning this fight in a very decisive way.

Did you expect to win everywhere last night?

I thought we’d win three of four; I was confident about Maine and Maryland, but I wasn’t sure about Minnesota and I was nervous about Tammy and a couple of the House seats. I thought we would win more than we lost, but I didn’t think we’d win everything.

In the bigger perspective, five years ago, 10 years ago, did you think we could have a night like last night?

No. Let me say it this way — I think this is the moment that had the most impact for me. You know, I was a proud supporter of President Kennedy — I couldn’t vote because I was 20 and the vote was 21 at the time — but I remember discovering later when I was doing research that he had proposed tightening the restriction on letting gay people be immigrants. There was language in the law, but they were afraid the Supreme Court might knock it down, so John Kennedy proposed that Congress tighten up the anti-gay legislation. John Kennedy’s head of the civil service, said we don’t want gay people working for us. That’s John Kennedy. Fifty years later, I’m standing on the stage with my husband when his great nephew, who is now being elected to Congress, introduces me and my husband and says how great it’s been to work with us. So yeah, I never would have thought that then.

Forty years ago, when I filed the first gay rights bills in the state of Massachusetts, I never thought we’d get to this. I have to say, if you asked me at any point during the 40 years I’ve been doing this, if you asked me what things would be like three years later, I would have been too pessimistic.

There’s another important factor: Barack Obama won a tough race, and the fact that he supported same-sex marriage almost certainly helped him and didn’t hurt him. There was no sign that coming out for same-sex marriage in any way hurt Barack Obama.

So as you leave Congress, do you feel good about the legacy you’ve left and the people replacing you?

Yes. [Rhode Island Democratic Rep.] David Cicilline, who won again last night, and [Colorado Democrat] Jared Polis, Tammy in the Senate, and the two more new people coming in, it’ll make five or six openly gay members of the House. And then I think next year you’re going to see Christine Quinn become the mayor of New York. I’d say within 10 years, we will have pretty much won this fight for equality. Only if we keep fighting, though, not if we ease up!

As you leave, how are you going to stay involved and what are the next big issues?

We still have ENDA and we still have DOMA to repeal, if the Supreme Court doesn’t do that. And we have a transgender agenda that I probably can’t pass now because the Republicans control the House, but I think the Senate will pass it just to show that it’s possible. I’m going to be just an activist — I’m going to be writing, speaking, going on TV, advocating on public policy. So I’ll be very much involved.

Just before called, I was reading Jennifer Rubin’s column saying that conservatives should abandon the marriage fight. Do you think they’re starting to realize it’s a losing battle? 

That’s happening. They thought they could get blacks and Hispanics to hate it. But yeah, I think you’ll see that increasingly. And they semi-did it this year, in that they didn’t try to use it against Obama. They’ll stick with abortion; abortion is a tougher moral issue for them, but I think that’s right. Same-sex marriage, there’ll be fewer and fewer places where they’ll be using that as an issue.

Well, congratulations again. I’m sure you’re excited.

Well, it’s been a really nice sort of a beginning and an end for me. The victory celebration for  Joe Kennedy, who’s going to be replacing me in Congress, was held in the room where Jim and I got married.

Alex Seitz-Wald

Alex Seitz-Wald is Salon's political reporter. Email him at aseitz-wald@salon.com, and follow him on Twitter @aseitzwald. More Alex Seitz-Wald.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • This photo. President Barack Obama has a laugh during the unveiling of the George W. Bush Presidential Center in Dallas, Tx., Thursday. Former first lady Barbara Bush, who candidly admitted this week we've had enough Bushes in the White House, is unamused.
    Reuters/Jason Reed

  • Rescue workers converge Wednesday in Savar, Bangladesh, where the collapse of a garment building killed more than 300. Factory owners had ignored police orders to vacate the work site the day before.
    AP/A.M. Ahad

  • Police gather Wednesday at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to honor campus officer Sean Collier, who was allegedly killed in a shootout with the Boston Marathon bombing suspects last week.
    AP/Elise Amendola

  • Police tape closes the site of a car bomb that targeted the French embassy in Libya Tuesday. The explosion wounded two French guards and caused extensive damage to Tripoli's upscale al-Andalus neighborhood.
    AP/Abdul Majeed Forjani

  • Protestors rage outside the residence of Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Sunday following the rape of a 5-year-old girl in New Delhi. The girl was allegedly kidnapped and tortured before being abandoned in a locked room for two days.
    AP/Manish Swarup

  • Clarksville, Mo., residents sit in a life boat Monday after a Mississippi River flooding, the 13th worst on record.
    AP/Jeff Roberson

  • Workers pause Wednesday for a memorial service at the site of the West, Tx., fertilizer plant explosion, which killed 14 people and left a crater more than 90 feet wide.
    AP/The San Antonio Express-News, Tom Reel

  • Aerial footage of the devastation following a 7.0 magnitude earthquake in China's Sichuan province last Saturday. At least 180 people were killed and as many as 11,000 injured in the quake.
    AP/Liu Yinghua

  • On Wednesday, Hazmat-suited federal authorities search a martial arts studio in Tupelo, Miss., once operated by Everett Dutschke, the newest lead in the increasingly twisty ricin case. Last week, President Barack Obama, Sen. Roger Wicker, R.-Miss., and a Mississippi judge were each sent letters laced with the deadly poison.
    AP/Rogelio V. Solis

  • The lighting of Freedom Hall at the George W. Bush Presidential Center Thursday is celebrated with (what else but) red, white and blue fireworks.
    AP/David J. Phillip

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 11 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

vote
Facebook has been used to find ex-lovers, childhood BFFs or the one who got away. He used it to find the guy who, without his consent, made him his drug mule.
247 points248 points | 23 comments
vote
“This could be a career ender for Michele Bachmann”
166 points167 points | 73 comments
vote
Poll: 3 in 10 voters say “armed revolution might be necessary” - 29% say they believe they'll have to act "in order to protect our liberties" in the next few years
50 points51 points | 18 comments
vote
"New evidence reveals big banks still illegally foreclosing on thousands of homes – and weak settlement allows it."
27 points28 points | comment
vote
Are millennials delusional? New research suggests that members of "Generation Me" are warped by a profound sense of entitlement
24 points25 points | 16 comments

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: "The Shelter Cycle": Raised in a cult

Recommendations