The closet was once the law. Without an LGBTQ+ Bill of Rights, it could be again

“Homosexual Rights? You’ve got to be kidding me.”

That was the reaction when the embryonic network of LGBTQ+ rights organizations, formed in those dark days, met in 1968. The “North American Conference of Homophile Organizations” adopted what they called the “Homosexual Bill of Rights.”

Their demands were extraordinary for the moment:

• Decriminalization: Private consensual sex between adults of legal age should not be considered a criminal offense.
• Security and Immigration: Sexual orientation should not affect the granting or renewal of federal security clearances, visas, or citizenship.
• Military Service: Service in the Armed Forces should be without regard to homosexuality.
• Employment Equity: Sexual orientation shall not impact employment eligibility with federal, state, local, or private employers.

Same-sex relationships were a felony in 49 states. The country was in the waning days of the Lavender Scare, when the federal government barred the employment of “known perverts.” Police harassment of queer bars was rampant — the kind of harassment that would ignite the Stonewall Rebellion just a year later, the uprising we commemorate with Pride each June. “Homosexual Rights?” The very notion seemed farcical.

Related: Fighting back: Lambda Legal unveils campaign to protect LGBTQ+ rights from Trump-era attacks

But over the next 50 years, the LGBTQ+ rights movement would win them all.

In 1997, the Ninth Circuit ruled in Pitcherskaia v. INS that people persecuted for their sexual orientation could seek asylum in the United States. In 2003, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the sodomy laws that had made LGBTQ+ people criminals in their own country in Lawrence v. Texas. Beginning with Matlovich v. Air Force in 1976, advocates fought for three decades for the right of LGBTQ+ people to serve their country openly, until President Obama finally repealed “don’t ask, don’t tell” in 2010. And in 2020, the Supreme Court ruled in Bostock v. Clayton County that employment discrimination based on gender identity or sexual orientation was illegal under federal civil rights law.

It is one of the great stories of American history: how a despised, disenfranchised, and marginalized minority leveraged our democratic system to win its rights. Today, that story is under direct assault.

Since 2022, more than 2,446 anti-LGBTQ+ bills have been introduced in state legislatures — at least one in every state — and 255 have become law in 27 states. An onslaught of executive orders from the Trump Administration has sought to strip the LGBTQ+ community, and especially its trans members, of the rights it spent decades winning. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas has explicitly called for overturning Obergefell v. Hodges and Lawrence v. Texas, which would instantaneously make same-sex relationships a crime again in 16 states. The Equality Act remains dead on arrival on Capitol Hill. It is a dark and frightening moment.

The gains of five decades can feel precarious all at once.

Which is exactly why it’s time for a New LGBTQ+ Bill of Rights — one that builds on the vision adopted in 1968, which guided this movement for five decades, and extends it to meet this moment. Lambda Legal announced one at its annual Liberty Awards on June 4.

Our demands include:

• Quality, affordable, and culturally competent health care that allows all LGBTQ+ people and people living with HIV to thrive.
• Inclusive public education that respects and cultivates the full potential of every student, regardless of gender identity or sexual orientation.
• A society that offers all LGBTQ+ people meaningful access to the American economy and our society.
• A Culture of Belonging where all LGBTQ+ people and their families are loved and valued.

Achieving these goals will not be easy. Access to health care, particularly for trans and HIV-positive members of our community, is under direct assault, with outright bans on gender-affirming care for young people in 27 states and active efforts to enact them at the federal level. Far from teaching respect for LGBTQ+ people, public schools in 12 states are constrained by laws that censor any discussion of LGBTQ+ people or issues. Employment discrimination remains the top reason people call the Lambda Legal Help Desk, despite being prohibited by Bostock. And polling shows support for LGBTQ+ equality declining, even as the community’s need for it grows.

In 1968, the forebears of our movement looked at a country where same-sex relationships were a felony, where queer people could be fired by the federal government for who they were, where the police raided their bars with impunity — and they had the audacity to demand their rights anyway. They didn’t wait for the country to be ready. They did the work that made the country ready. And they won.

That’s the model. That’s the history. It’s time for history to repeat itself.

Kevin Jennings is the CEO of Lambda Legal, the oldest and largest legal organization fighting for the civil rights of LGBTQ+ people and everyone living with HIV. Read more about Lambda Legal’s call for a New LGBTQ+ Bill of Rights at: Strategic Plan - Lambda Legal

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