Ashcroft and Gay Rights

[Bryan Wildenthal]

Cheerfully accepting Brad Clanton's challenge:

Leaving aside (as I've already noted) that Ashcroft personally acted to deny
James Hormel a job solely because Hormel is gay, Ashcroft was a vocal
opponent of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (providing one of the
decisive votes to defeat it, 49-50, in the Senate in Sept. 1996).  Ashcroft
justified his opposition to ENDA by arguing that it was important to be able
to deny gay people jobs in certain areas.  He cited a case in which a high
school coach was discovered to have led a "double life" and been involved in
gay pornography.  Leaving aside the implied defamatory slur against gay men
(as if we were all moonlighting in porn films on the side!) the obvious
implication of his argument was that gay people could not generally be
trusted for certain "sensitive" jobs involving contact with children.  It
would not be rationally coherent to make such arguments against legislation
proscribing anti-gay employment discrimination, unless one believed (as
Ashcroft obviously does) that such discrimination is in fact justifiable,
even desirable and necessary, in certain cases.

Also, I believe Ashcroft was one of the dwindling minority of Senators who
declined to adopt a non-discrimination policy with regard to sexual
orientation for his own staff.

Also, I believe Ashcroft favors excluding openly gay men and women from the
military (in effect barring military employment for ANY gay men or women on
even remotely equal terms with heterosexuals, who are of course permitted to
be as open as they like about their heterosexuality) under the so-called
"Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy (though that was enacted before he was
elected to the Senate).

Need I go on?

Bryan Wildenthal, Thomas Jefferson School of Law

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Clanton, Brad [mailto:Brad.Clanton at MAIL.HOUSE.GOV]
> Sent: Friday, January 19, 2001 2:32 PM
> To: CONLAWPROF at listserv.ucla.edu
> Subject: Re: Ashcroft and Gay Rights
>
>
> Bryan Wildenthal wrote:
>
> "Some of my own family members, fundamentalist Christians
> whom I love and
> respect very much,
> believe that homosexual conduct is sinful and wrong.  They do
> not, however,
> as Ashcroft appears to, favor denying employment to people
> simply because
> they are gay."
>
> With due respect, I challenge Professor Wildenthal or anyone
> else to point
> to any statements by Mr. Ashcroft which demonstrate that he
> "favors" denying
> employment to people because they are gay.  To say that as a matter of
> public policy one does not support proscribing individuals
> from engaging in
> a condemnable activity does not mean one favors it.
>
> Brad Clanton