Nov 05, 2004  |  By: LOU CHIBBARO JR.  | COMMENTS     

Last month marked the 25th anniversary of the 1979 National March on Washington for Lesbian & Gay Rights, an event that some organizers say had a far greater impact on the gay movement than the government and society it sought to change.

The first of four gay marches on the nation’s capital — the others were held in 1987, 1993 and 2000 — the 1979 march was conceived largely by a cadre of maverick gay Americans who had stronger ties to left-leaning progressive causes than to the established national gay groups of that period, according to some of the organizers and participants.

“None of the established groups wanted anything to do with [the march] until it became clear it was going to happen and it had widespread support from local communities across the country,” said veteran lesbian activist Robin Tyler of Los Angeles, who was among the earliest advocates of the 1979 protest.

After nearly a year of planning, a network of gay activists representing different regions of the country hammered out a compromise plan for the march’s theme, political demands, and platform speakers.

Between 75,000 to 100,000 people attended, according to estimates by various sources. The turnout disappointed some but astounded others, including some of the more establishment-oriented activists who feared only a few thousand people would show up.

Starting at a site near the U.S. Capitol, the march traveled along Pennsylvania Avenue past the White House before reaching the Washington Monument grounds, where a sound stage had been set up for the rally.

Among the speakers were poets Allen Ginsberg and Audre Lorde, feminist activist and writer Kate Millett, D.C. Mayor Marion Barry, San Francisco Supervisor Harry Britt, ousted gay U.S. Army Sgt. Leonard Mattlovich, and U.S. Rep. Ted Weiss, the chief sponsor of a House gay rights bill.

“You were just amazed and astounded to see so many of our own people in one place,” said D.C. lesbian photographer and filmmaker Joan E. Biren, who publishes her photos under the name JEB.

“I was very publicly out, but there were not too many others who were,” Biren said. “The triumph of the 1979 march was that so many people did come out. To me, the importance was we were going to be a political force. This was the most visible we had ever been.”

Getting on board
Veteran D.C. gay activist Frank Kameny, who initially opposed the march, said he, too, was converted to the ranks of supporters when he became convinced the event would attract a relatively large crowd.

Kameny is credited with being one of the gay movement’s founding fathers for his role as a movement strategist and organizer in the late 1950s. He said his biggest fear was that a small turnout for a national gay march would make the gay movement look weak and insignificant.

“I stood on Pennsylvania Avenue and congratulated Steve Ault,” said Kameny, referring to one of the lead organizers of the 1979 march. Ault could not be reached by press time for this report.

Little effect on Carter
Most organizers of the march considered the widespread coverage of the march in the mainline news media to be favorable. Network television news programs and newspapers across the country gave it extensive coverage.

But other activists, including Tyler, acknowledged that the Oct. 14, 1979, march had little impact on Congress and the administration of President Jimmy Carter, who declined to support gay rights legislation.

Tyler and a number of D.C. activists who attended conferences in Philadelphia and Houston, which were called to plan the march, said the behind-the-scenes deliberations and the widespread participation by activists in these conferences appeared to have an important impact on the gay movement.

Up until that time, most gay rights initiatives, including efforts to persuade government policy makers to pass gay rights laws, were set by established groups. The then National Gay Task Force and the Gay Rights National Lobby were the two leading national groups working on gay issues, with the task force located in New York City and GRNL in Washington, D.C.

In their 1999 book, “Out for Good: The Struggle to Build a Gay Rights Movement in America,” New York Times reporters Dudley Clendinen and Adam Nagourney wrote that the idea of a march on Washington for gay ...