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Pat Steadman Fights to Turn Colorado Blue

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.
An Advocate.com exclusive posted October 7, 2008
Pat Steadman Fights to Turn Colorado Blue

* 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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Post is the Political Editor for GayWired.com
Keywords:  2008 Election 
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