The Militant(logo) 
    Vol.63/No.1           January 11, 1999 
 
 
25 & 50 Years Ago  

January 11, 1974
For the fourth time in three years, the New York city council has rejected a bill to outlaw discrimination against homosexuals. The bill was killed Dec. 20 before it even got out of committee. The 13 council members voting, all Democrats, defeated the measure 9 to 4.

The bill would outlaw discrimination in housing, employment, and public accommodations. It has been the focus of much activity by gay liberation groups in the past. This time, however, there were no demonstrations outside City Hall, because of assurances from legislators that the measure would pass, and cautions that protest actions might "turn off" city council members.

A meeting of gay organizations following the defeat denounced the vote as "yet another example of the cynical indifference to human beings demonstrated by the city council."

The groups declared that they are "at the end of their patience" and will launch a renewed campaign to win passage of the bill this year.

January 3, 1949
The left wing of the Democratic Party finds itself on the spot on the Negro question. Discrimination against Negroes is part of the life-blood of American capitalism.

A case in point is the decision by the Appellate Division of the Court of New York supporting discrimination against Negroes in the Stuyvesant Housing project.

Bartley Crum is another of these liberals and his paper, the New York Star, very often expresses the views of this particular wing of the Democratic party. It printed an editorial on the decision, bursting with righteousness, good will and desire for Negro emancipation. Until these fast-talking politicians point out that not only [Fiorello] La Guardia in New York, but their own Democratic Party, ruler of the country for sixteen years, has been the most active practitioner and exemplar of Jim Crow in the country, we shall continue to insist that on this, as on all other serious politics affecting the people, these liberals and their circle are a powerful obstacle in the road of Negro and all other types of emancipation.

 
 
 
Front page (for this issue) | Home | Text-version home