Believe it or not, there was a time when a person in the U.S. could get arrested and charged with a crime for being a part of the LGBTQ community. If someone identified as lesbian, gay or any sexuality outside of heterosexual, police could use charges such as, sexual assault, sodomy, vagrancy and more to make it difficult for that person.
This was the circumstance for political activist and civil rights leader Bayard Rustin. On a mission to end racism, Rustin became one of the counsels for Martin Luther King Jr. during the Civil Rights Movement.
He championed many sit-ins, boycotts, peaceful protests and marches. Rustin also was essential in organizing the transformational March on Washington in 1963, in which Dr. King did his famous “I Have A Dream” speech.
But, his work and reputation would be overshadowed by an incident that occurred in 1953. In town on business, he was allegedly found engaging in sexual activity with two males in a car in Pasadena, CA.
Rustin was arrested and sentenced to almost two months in L.A. County Jail. Upon his release, he had registered as a sex offender forever tainting his reputation until he died in 1987.
While he continued to work on social justice and community initiatives, many peers distanced themselves after the public revelation of his sexuality. He also lost his leadership role at the Fellowship of Reconciliation, an organization that advocated for peace and justice through nonviolent tactics. At that time, it was taboo to identity as LGBTQ.
“Generations of LGBT people, including countless gay men, were branded criminals and sex offenders simply because they had consensual sex,” Sen. Scott Wiener said. “This was often life-ruining, and many languished on the sex offender registry for decades.”
Through the encouragement of LGBTQ groups and the Legislative Black Caucus, it wasn’t until recently that the Governor of California, Gov. Gavin Newsom, reviewed the case and decided to pardon Rustin due to the laws of that time being outdated and highly discriminative.
“In California and across the country, many laws have been used as legal tools of oppression, and to stigmatize and punish LGBTQ people and communities and warn others what harm could await them for living authentically,” Newsom said in a statement.
Newsom has been at the forefront of the fight for equality for the LGBTQ community. As mayor of San Francisco in 2004, he pushed for same-sex marriages to be legal. Through a new executive order granting clemency to those who were imprisoned or convicted based on discriminative practices may be considered for pardons.
President Barack Obama acknowledged Rustin’s contributions to the movement of equality and justice by posthumously awarding him the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2013.
With the pardon, Rustin is now liberated from the harsh labeling of the criminal justice system that made his life difficult all because he was black, gay and a trailblazer.
