Current school District policy prohibits non-district-sanctioned clubs from making announcements or posting information on school grounds that is considered “proselytizing.”

Connie McNair, a junior and member of the school’s Gay Straight Alliance, said that the school was censoring the group.

“We just want the same privileges as other clubs have.”

This week Lambda Legal sent a letter to South Medford High School Principal Kevin Campbell, Medford School District Superintendent Phil Long, and the School Board reminding them that students are protected by the First Amendment and the federal Equal Access Act.

The EAA prohibits schools receiving federal funds and which allow any extracurricular student groups to meet from discriminating against other groups.

The letter accuses school officials of imposing restrictions on the Medford High GSA to which no other on-campus group is subject and that seriously burden club members’ free speech and associational rights.

These include requiring GSA members to get prior approval for their announcements and activities from an assistant principal, deeming the club’s legitimate educational activities illicit “proselytizing,” and even prohibiting the club from formally announcing today’s “Day of Silence.”

In the letter, Lambda Legal Staff Attorney Tara Borelli writes “While we hope that the school’s actions to deter the GSA’s activities are simply the result of confusion about its obligations, the law in this area is well–established and school’s unequal treatment of the GSA is difficult to understand and should be remedied swiftly.”

“It’s simply unlawful for South Medford High School to create unequal obstacles for Connie or the GSA, or to stifle the GSA’s announcements about the Day of Silence,” said Borelli.  “We want to remind South Medford school officials that they have a responsibility to protect lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender students, and we’re asking them to lift any restriction applying to the GSA but not to other groups.”

A school district spokesperson said that the district has policies designed to protect LGBT students.

“This is an opportunity for us to learn and refine what we’re doing,” said Doug Jantzi, Medford schools secondary education director. “Our goal is that students will have a voice and equity, and we will make corrections if needed.”

The groups, which include Lambda Legal and the National Coalition for LGBT Health, call the rules “unnecessary and confusing” and say they endanger public health.

The new regulations went into effect on Dec. 19, 2008.  At that time, HHS claimed they were needed to protect employees of organizations receiving HHS funds from having to perform procedures they find religiously or morally objectionable.

The 14-page letter submitted Tuesday to HHS says the regulations could give wide latitude to health care workers to discriminate against co-workers or patients who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or living with HIV.

“Federal law already rightly guarantees workers broad protections against religiously motivated discrimination,” said Lambda Legal Senior Counsel Jennifer C. Pizer.

“But everyone would agree that those protections cannot be absolute – they wouldn’t allow a Jehovah’s Witness surgeon to withhold blood transfusions from patients based on the doctor’s religious objection, for example.  These regulations – which can be seen as expanding existing protections so health care workers can harass co-workers or choose to treat some patients, but not others – should be rescinded, as the government is now proposing to do,” said Pizer.

Studies show anti-LGBT bias is a persistent problem among health care providers, and religious disapproval of gay people frequently contributes to that.  In August 2008, the California Supreme Court ruled that religion cannot be used as a legal excuse for doctors to deny infertility treatment to Oceanside lesbian Lupita Benítez.  Her doctors had claimed that California’s constitutional protections of religion allowed them to refuse to inseminate her after 11 months of preparatory medications and surgical treatments, but the high court disagreed unanimously.

“If HHS’s new regulations are allowed to remain in effect, they will have a negative impact on health care for a great many Americans,” said Rebecca Fox, director of the National Coalition for LGBT Health.

“In a country where so many people struggle to access quality health care, HHS created another barrier. These regulations are particularly harmful for LGBT Americans, many of whom already fear being out to their healthcare providers and struggle to find and afford respectful, good quality medical care,” Fox added.

HHS has now proposed rescinding the regulations.  If that does not occur, the regulations could cause confusion in everything ranging from who receives care to which organizations can receive federal funding and may result in federally funded programs and health care providers inappropriately refusing to treat LGBT or HIV positive patients in a medically sound, respectful manner, the groups said.

“The Bush Administration put people with HIV at risk with these unnecessary regulations,” said Bebe J. Anderson, director of Lambda Legal’s HIV Project.  “Unfortunately, discrimination and ignorance towards people with HIV are still common. The government must not invite or sanction discrimination against people with HIV or LGBT patients.”

Note: Go check out what colleagues Emma and Jenna have to say about this topic.

A few years back I covered a marriage rights rally. After dutifully taking notes during the speeches (all typical and boilerplate), I walked the crowd looking for people to talk to. Spoke to everyone from the older gay male couple, who left the country to get married, to the young straight duo. She was there because for her it was unfair she could marry her love but her father could not do the same.

Walked up to a middle aged gay man, who was standing alone, and he had a lot to say. It was time gays and lesbians got off our collective “lazy butts” and pushed the same sex marriage memo. Anyone who stood in the way of marriage rights didn’t understand the Constitution and Rush Limbaugh was a dupe. After 10 minutes, I thanked him and looked to move on. We talked a bit and he continued with his Limbaugh rant. He said he listened to Limbaugh and was amazed at the intellectual dishonesty.

“And no one is fighting him,” he complained.

He then told me of an idea he had for a radio show. A program where he could logically make the case for gay rights and fight the Limbaughs of the world.

“Do you know I can get such a thing started,” he asked.

As a bottom feeder in the media world, I noted I was not the person to ask about a gig; however, why didn’t he volunteer some time to the group that organized the rally. He stared at me for a few seconds.

“Yeah, we need a radio show that fights the hate.”

I want to be kind to this fellow because he wasn’t a kook in the traditional sense (you find them at all political rallies), but the grunt work for freedom wasn’t on his agenda. Instead he wanted the bells and whistles. What do I mean by bells and whistles? Calls for marching on Washington or the fetishization of ACT-UP as if gay rights is a perpetual photo-opp with angry queens.

Yes freedom struggles in America at times have included marching and taking to the streets, but that is not the only quiver. Just because there isn’t some large rally that makes the news stations scurrying doesn’t mean hard work isn’t being done. Look at the organization Lambda Legal. I can’t even think of the last rally they sponsored on their own, but the group is in the trenches doing the work that isn’t particularly glamorous but is essential.

There is nothing wrong with the occasional march, but there is more to rights than yelling some tired cant (am I the only one who groans when “the people united will never be defeated” gets started?). To all of you who point to the civil rights movement as template for what gays and lesbians should do, you need to learn history. What happened in the 196’s came about because lots of people, a few famous most anonymous, did small things. Served a meal, typed a letter, drove a speaker to the next gig, copied a speech, sat down with an ally, donated some cash, sat on a committee. Without those small boring non-dramatic moments freedom never comes.

More than 10 years ago, we made good on our investment in making change in the South by opening a Southern Regional Office in Atlanta and soon after, a South Central Regional Office in Dallas — and that investment continues to pay off.

We recently won two court victories in Louisiana and one in Virginia, and we are representing plaintiffs in cases in Florida, Alabama, Tennessee and Georgia.

Our three most recent victories have strengthened legal recognition of same-sex relationships and families, even where there are no domestic partnership or other laws available. At the Virginia Supreme Court, we and our co-counsel protected the court-ordered visitation that gave Janet Jenkins the right to see her daughter after Janet’s former partner tried to deny her that parenting right.

In Louisiana, we defeated the efforts of the antigay Alliance Defense Fund to eliminate domestic partner benefits for city employees in New Orleans, and won a ruling from a federal court that state officials must list the names of both fathers on the birth certificate of the Louisiana-born child whom they adopted in New York.

We are there to back LGBT people who stand up for fairness in hostile communities, as in Johnson City, Tennessee, where we’re challenging the biased conduct of the local police department. The department took unprecedented steps to harm and embarrass men they arrested in a public sex sting by holding a press conference to announce their arrest and publishing their photographs in the local paper. 

 The police are not allowed to give additional punishment to people they don’t like, nor are they allowed to ignore the principle of “innocent until proven guilty” by punishing people in advance. Kenneth Giles lost his job because of the police misconduct, and we’re fighting with him for justice.

The LGBT community is speaking up in Birmingham, Alabama, too. Central Alabama Pride has held a gay pride parade through the streets of Birmingham every year since 1987, and had its Pride banners displayed just like any other group.

However, last year, the mayor announced that he would neither sign a proclamation nor allow city employees to hang their parade banners based on his religious beliefs that do not “condone that lifestyle choice.” We’re standing with Central Alabama Pride and suing the mayor for infringing their free speech rights and treating them unequally. 

In Georgia, we’re representing Vandy Beth Glenn, a transgender woman who was fired from her job as an editor at the state legislature because state officials disapproved of her gender transition.

We also filed a friend-of-the-court brief in a case before the Georgia Supreme Court to challenge a discriminatory requirement that a gay father not be allowed to see his children whenever other LGBT people were present. 

In Florida, the Social Security Administration told a gay disabled father named Gary Day that it could not approve benefits for his children because it claimed they were not his children “for the purposes of child insurance benefits…;” a fertility clinic in Orlando denied medical services to a gay man named Dennis Barros; and a hospital employee told Janice Langbehn that she was in an antigay hospital in an antigay state. Janice was not allowed to be with her lesbian partner as she lay dying in Miami’s Jackson Memorial Hospital.

Gary, Dennis and Janice are standing up for equality in Florida, and we are representing each of them.

The attorneys and community education team in our Southern Regional Office and South Central Regional Office have been busy, working with clients and within their communities to make changes that count.

As a national organization, Lambda Legal is taking the fight wherever we need to go, and wherever LGBT people and people with HIV need the power of legal advocacy to protect and defend their civil rights.

Rita Goodman and her then-partner Siobhan LaPiana planned to have a family.  LaPiana gave birth to two children, now aged 11 and 8.

Both women equally parented the boys, who love and rely on both of them as their mothers ,according to court documents filed by Lambda Legal which represents Goodman.

Before the birth of the first child, Goodman and LaPiana drafted and signed a parenting agreement detailing their intent to share all responsibilities of parenthood.

After the couple ended their 10-relationship, LaPiana began restricting Goodman’s time with the boys. 

In February 2007, Goodman filed a lawsuit, and in August 2008, the trial court ordered visitation for Goodman.

 LaPiana appealed, arguing among other things that Ohio’s antigay constitutional amendment prevents courts from entering orders permitting former lesbian partners to share custody, and that the court’s order unconstitutionally infringed on her right to autonomy as a parent.

“The Ohio Supreme Court already has said that Ohio’s antigay constitutional amendment does not prevent a same-sex couple from sharing custody of the children they are rearing together,” said Lambda Attorney Camilla Taylor in a statement.

” We shouldn’t have to address this hurtful and discriminatory argument any longer. The trial court below in this case did the right thing by focusing on the needs of the children, and awarding shared custody to these women based on more than a century of Ohio case law allowing such orders.”

Goodman said that the issue is about the well-being of the children.

“This has always been about my sons and making sure they can rely on both of their parents. I made a promise to take care of them always — and I’m just trying to make good on that promise,” said Goodman.

Last December in a similar case argued by Lambda, the Ohio Supreme Court rejected a similar effort by a woman in a custody dispute with her former partner to use Ohio’s antigay constitutional amendment to sever the parental relationship between her child and her former partner.

In letters this week to the new President and the leadership of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Lambda legal stressed the need for fair and impartial nominees to the federal bench who will address issues facing the gay community without bias.

“In the coming years, a number of key issues that significantly impact the gay community are likely to arise in the federal courts,” said Lambda Legal Executive Director Kevin Cathcart, “The foremost consideration in nominating federal judges should be their commitment to rendering decisions impartially.”

During his two terms, President Bush appointed 326 judges to the federal bench.

“It is no secret that the Bush Administration’s goal was to pack the federal courts at all levels with arch-conservative judges who would be unfriendly to the vigorous protection of civil rights — not only for gay people, but for everyone,” said Cathcart.

The letters are a follow-up to a memo Lambda Legal provided to the Obama Transition Team. It urged President-Elect Obama to nominate federal justices who adhere to precedents established in cases of importance to the gay community- including the right to privacy, protection against laws based on antigay bias, the right to sue in state courts under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and protections against HIV discrimination, among others.

The letters also seek to promote judicial integrity through the nomination of jurists who represent the nation’s diversity including people who identify as LGBT, people of color, women, and those with public defender and public interest legal backgrounds.

But this is not over: the very next day, we began fighting back.

We don’t think this is the way democracy is supposed to work in California, and we are going to court to stop Prop 8 from taking effect. Lambda Legal, the National Center for Lesbian Rights (NCLR) and the ACLU are representing Equality California and six same-sex couples.

The heart of our legal argument boils down to this: A fundamental liberty of a minority group is being stripped away by a simple majority vote. This makes the equal protection clause of the constitution meaningless.

Can you do that in California with one vote? We don’t think so. 

California’s constitution requires a different process. In order to make a fundamental revision to the constitution that would change the way state government works in California, the revision must first, at a minimum, be approved by a two-thirds vote of each chamber of the legislature, and it then must be sent to the people for a vote.

Why is there a more difficult process required to make the change intended by Prop 8?

We all learned about it in grade school: The framers of both the federal and the California constitutions understood that a primary function of the courts and constitutions is to protect minority groups from the will of the majority when it comes to fundamental rights. Can 51 percent of the people vote to take away the free speech rights of women, but not of men? We don’t think so. Can 51 percent of the people vote to say that Christians are free to worship as they choose, but people of other faiths may not? Not a chance.

If Prop 8 were implemented, it would fundamentally change the meaning of the constitution and the role of the courts in protecting fundamental rights. Prop 8 passed through only the initiative process without a two-thirds vote of the legislature. That’s why it’s invalid.

After this incredible and emotional election, we take both the long and short view. The long view shows that both public opinion and history are moving steadily in the right direction.

The election of Barack Obama as president proves that change is possible and that prejudice can be overcome. Fifty years ago, black Americans still lived in segregated communities and were blocked both from voting and equal opportunities for employment. Only 40 years ago, the U.S. Supreme Court decided Loving v.Virginia, striking down the remaining laws banning interracial marriages, and now we have elected a president who is the child of an interracial marriage.

And only eight years ago, the original Prop 22 (the Knight Initiative) that banned marriage for same-sex couples in California passed by a nearly two-to-one margin (61 to 38 percent), while this year Prop 8 barely passed by two percentage points.

The long view gives us hope and a vision of the future.

In the short view, we are confronting bitter losses not only in California but also in Florida, Arizona and Arkansas, and we’re fighting back because our relationships and families deserve dignity and respect. We are preparing for oral arguments before the Iowa Supreme Court to defend our marriage-equality victory there, and we are seeking justice for Janice Langbehn, who was not allowed to see her dying partner in a hospital in Miami.

In fighting back against the injustice of Prop 8 and the other ballot measures that targeted LGBT people, we stand together with other groups that have faced discrimination, not against them.

People of color and people of all faiths have fought for freedom and are part of our LGBT communities across the country. Divide and conquer is the oldest political strategy in the world. If we fall victim to it, the extreme right will have won a lot more than this year’s ballot measures. 
As we anticipate the inauguration of the 44th American president, we are not simply waiting for change to come to us, we are working for it — through community education, by preparing for the political struggles ahead, and by doing what Lambda Legal does best — making the case for equality in our courts.

This is what democracy looks like.

Kevin Cathcart is the executive director of Lambda Legal.