Since
Colorado’s Amendment 2 changed the state constitution
to prohibit new laws to protect lesbians and gays from
discrimination in 1992, LGBT activist Pat Steadman has
been at the forefront of Colorado's equal rights
battle. Now, for the first time since that year, Colorado
looks like it could well swing Democrat in November's
election, thanks in large part to the work of Steadman
and Equal Rights Colorado.
* This is the second article in The Advocate's
continuing coverage of four battleground states:
Colorado, Florida, Virginia, and Ohio. Click
here to read the previous installment.
In 1992,
Colorado’s Amendment 2 changed the state constitution
to prohibit new laws to protect lesbians and gays from
discrimination. It may have been the biggest gift that
the Radical Christian Right could have given the LGBT
community in that state.
“Amendment
2 brought a lot of allies out of the closet and spurred us
all to action,” explained Pat Steadman, a
veteran LGBT activist in Colorado who lobbies on
behalf of Equal Rights Colorado as well as a host of other
progressive organizations. “Nobody expected it to
pass. Segments of the community thought ‘I
don’t have to get off my couch and do
anything.’ Once it passed, those people got off
their couches and we began doing the organizing that
we hadn’t done adequately during the vote.”
A 1991 law school
graduate, Amendment 2 was Steadman’s “big
call” to politics.
With its passage,
he worked to create the legal defense group that
eventually brought the constitutionality of Amendment 2 to
the U.S. Supreme Court. Just four years after it
passed, the measure was struck down on May 6, 1996 in
the 6-3 Romer v. Evans decision. In his
majority decision, Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote, “a
State cannot so deem a class of persons a stranger to its
laws.”
They are words
that Steadman thinks are beautiful and ones he’ll
always remember. Given his record since then,
they’re also the words that have fueled his
work. Now a partner in Mendez, Steadman & Associates, a
Denver-based political consulting and lobbying firm,
Steadman wrote and helped to pass legislation that has
changed the landscape for LGBT Coloradans.
In 2005, an
amendment to the state hate crimes bill to include sexual
orientation and gender identity was approved. In 2007, the
legislature passed and the governor signed two
important Steadman-written bills -- the second parent
adoption law and the sexual orientation and gender
identity non-discrimination act. The next year, he wrote
legislation that added sexual orientation and gender
identity to every non-discrimination state statute.
“It covers
areas like jury duty,” Steadman explained.
“People haven’t been kicked off of a
jury for being gay but if we’re going to have laws
like that, they should be totally inclusive.”
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