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The Carolinas' Most Comprehensive Gay & Lesbian Newspaper
Published Every Two Weeks On Recycled Paper • Volume 12, Number 12 • November 1, 1997 • FREE
SC solicitor outed, accused of misconduct by GOP
Red Wing at town hall meeting
HRC reps work
across the state
by David Stout
Q'Xotes Staff
CHARLOTTE—Human Rights Cam
paign (HRC) staffers Donna Red Wing, na
tional field director, and Tony Esoldo, South
ern field organizer, were in NC in mid-Octo
ber for a whirlwind trip around the state dur
ing which they networked, led activist trainings
and offered updates on the critical issues facing
the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender move
ment.
NC Pride PAC Executive Director MK
Cullen shutded them to scheduled events in
Charlotte, Greensboro, Durham and Raleigh
during their stay. “It was great to have HRC’s
field department here in NC, working at the
grassroots level,” she said. “They helped every
one make the connection between federal, state
and local issues.”
Red Wing and Esoldo flew into Charlotte
on Wednesday, October 15 for their first meet
ing, a town hall held at MCC Charlotte. The
political power of the right-wing was a recur
ring theme during presentations by local activ
ists Michael Armentrout, who serves on HRC’s
board of governors, Phil Wells, a Pride PAC
board member, and Cullen, Esoldo and Red
Wing. Topics covered during the meeting in
cluded the Employment Non-Discrimination
Act (ENDA), Hawaii marriage case and the
flurry of gay-related bills introduced in the last
NC General Assembly session.
After an overnight stay in Charlone, the
staffers traveled to Greensboro. They spent the
day meeting members of the gay student alli
ances at UNC-Greensboro and Guilford Col
lege and later attended a meeting of the Triad
Business and Professional Guild. The meeting
took the form of a panel discussion around the
issue of arts funding and Winston-Salem Mayor
Martha Wood was one of the panelists.
Greensboro city councilmembers cut com
munity arts funds in early summer, sparked by
a performance of the gay-themed musical Im
Cage Aux Folks. Although they recendy voted
to delete the anti-gay language from the
deftinding bill, they did not restore any of the
money. Red Wing explained that the situation
in Greensboro was only one part of a larger anti
arts movement, connecting it to the Right’s ef
fort to dismantle the National Endowment of
the Arts.
After the Guild meeting, the group drove
to the Triangle where the remainder of their
itinerary was scheduled. On Friday, they met
with Gothic Queers, the gay students’ group at
Duke University, and later spoke with folks at
Triangle CommunityWorks!, a coalition of
community-based organizations who share
meeting and organizing space in Raleigh.
SEE HRC on page 15
by David Stout
Q-Notes Staff
CHARLESTON, SC—Republican party
officials outed one of their own last month in
an attempt to force him out of office simply
because he is gay — at least that’s what Ninth
Circuit Solicitor David Schwacke, the target of
the campaign, asserts.
Schwacke, the chief prosecutor in Charles
ton and Berkeley counties, said that local Re
publicans’ charges that he used computers in
the solicitor’s office to download sexually-ex-
plicit pictures off the Internet are meant to drive
him out of office because party leaders don’t
approve of his sexual orientation.
Charleston County Republican Chairman
Mark Hartley, Vice Chairwoman Cyndi
Mosteller and three others sent letters to Gov.
David Beasley, State Attorney General Charlie
Condon and the SC Law Enforcement Divi
sion requesting an investigation of the charges.
Religious conservatives have a strong grip
on the GOP in SC and some of Schwacke’s
accusers are among them. Hardey and Mosteller
denied that sexual orientation influenced their
decision to call for an investigation of Schwacke;
but, one of the other complainants, state Re
publican party executive committee member
Lyons Williams, stated that it did play a role in
his involvement.
Under state employment policy, workers can
be disciplined or fired if they use a state-owned
computer for “immoral purposes.” Since
Schwacke holds an elected position — with
three years left of his second, four-year term —
it is not clear if their would be a violation of
SC reguladons even if the charges were true.
Attorney General Condon turned the case over
to an assistant since he supervised Schwacke in
the Charleston Solicitor’s office before becom
ing the state’s prosecutor.
Schwacke was married 14 years until this
past June when his wife divorced him after their
10-year-old son discovered explicit photos in
the couple’s home. He wouldn’t say if the pic
tures came from the Internet. Schwacke had
remained closeted about his sexual orientation
until these allegations came to light, but came
out in an interview with the Charkston Post &
Courier on October 8 — three days before
National Coming Out Day — in which he la
beled the allegations a “gay-bashing.” He said
he wanted to “make it impossible for all these
rumors to hurt me any further.”
Many gays and lesbians in the region were
angry that Schwacke had been forced to make
such an intimate decision under duress. Mike
Schwarzott, co-chairman of the Lowcountry
Gay and Lesbian Alliance, told the Post dr Cou
rier, “Coming out is a very personal and pri
vate matter and should not be forced onto any
individual against their wishes or for any po
litical agenda. We must consider what our ac
tions will cause for anyone being outed against
their wishes, to their family and in their per
sonal lives.”
Some of the state’s conservative legislators
have asked Schwacke to step down, labeling his
See SOLICITOR on page 15
Appeals Court upholds nation’s last ballot measure
by Peg Byron
Special to Q-Notes
CINCINNATI, OH—On Oaober 23, a
federal appeals court upheld Cincinnati’s Issue
3, the country’s sole remaining anti-gay initia
tive that seeks to ban discrimination protections
for lesbians and gay men, said representatives
from Lambda Legal Defense and Education
Fund, the nation’s oldest and largest gay legal
organization and co-counsel in the case.
Patricia M. Logue, managing attorney for
Lambda’s Midwest Regional Office in Chicago,
condemned this result. The United States Court
of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit previously up
held Issue 3 in a 1995 ruling. The US Supreme
Court last year threw out that decision and or
dered the appeals court to reconsider the case
in light of the high court’s ruling against
Colorado’s anti-gay amendment.
“This is a renegade decision approving a
clone of the Colorado ballot measure thrown
out by the Supreme Court,” Logue said, refer
ring to last year’s historic ruling against that
state’s Amendment 2. “Upholding Issue 3 is
simply indefensible,” she said.
Staff Attorney Suzanne B. Goldberg, who
worked on the case from Lambda’s New York
headquarters, said, “The Supreme Court rel
egated such anti-gay ballot initiauves to history’s
trash heap. Unfortunately, the Sixth Circuit
failed to understand that.”
“Issue 3 mimicked Amendment 2 which the
high court demolished with its landmark Romer
V. Evans ruling last year,” said Lambda Legal
Director Beatrice Dohrn. “Lambda, our client,
and co-counsel will look closely at whether we
again will appeal to the Supreme Court or to
the full Sixth Circuit.”
Case history
The Cincinnati ^neasure seeks to repeal all
laws in Cincinnati forbidding discrimination
against lesbians, gay men and bisexuals and it
would amend the city charter to prevent law
makers from ever passing such legislative pro
tections. It has never taken effect because of
court injunctions.
Cincinnati voters approved Issue 3 in 1993
amid a nationwide campaign by right-wing
extremists to promote anti-gay bigotry and b^
legal protections for gay people gainst discrimi
nation. Lambda and its colleagues immediately
challenged the measure in federal district court.
After a lengthy trial, the lower court rejected
Issue 3 as a violation of the constitutional guar
antees of equal protection, free expression and
due process for lesbians and gay men. The Sixth
Circuit reversed that ruling on all grounds; that
decision was appealed to the Supreme Court.
After its May 1996 Romer decision, the high
court ordered the Sixth Circuit to re-examine
its earlier validati9n of Issue 3.
In addition to helping defeat the Colorado
anti-gay initiative. Lambda helped dash a simi
lar measure passed in Florida’s Alachua County
in 1994; a state judge there struck down the
county’s Amendment 1 last fall, based on Romer.
Logue and Goldberg are Lambda’s attorneys
on behalf of Equality Foundation of Greater
Cincinnati in the Issue 3 challenge. Cincinnati
civil rights attorney Alphonse A. Gerhardstein,
who argued the case before the Sixth Circuit
this past March, is also co-counsel, along with
Scott Greenwood of the ACLU of Ohio and
Ohio attorney Richard Cordray. T
OutCharlotte ’97 was a triumph of GLBT visibility
by Brian D. Holcomb
Q-Notes Staff
On October 12, a group of tearful commu
nity members stood together on the stage of
Theatre Charlotte, congratulating each other,
receiving the thanks of the audience and prov
ing that the Charlotte GLBT community not
only has a voice, but has one that should be
heard. The Steering Committee for the third
OutCharlotte Festival worked for an entire year
to produce the weekend of activities and events
surrounding National Coming Out Day on
Oaober 11. Their hard work and
commitment were obvious and
their Festival proved that
OutCharlotte was not just a good
idea for a few years, but a major
community event for now and the
future.
In retrospea, the OutCharlotte Festivals can
be seen to have separate themes. This is partly
the work of the oi^anizcrs and partly a result of
the performers and speakers available during
each event. For whatever reason, OutCharlotte
I was the Festival of Pride. OutCharlotte II was
the Festival of Unity. OutCharlotte III was all
about Visibility.
The 1997 event was more extensive than ei
ther of the previous two, making the Festival
more about community than about individual
performances. The additions were notable and
appreciated by the community. The first major
event was a potluck supper and talent show
which was won by Candice Whiteside and her
surprisingly true stories of Southern life. The
previous Friday, the Blue Pony Gallery put
OutCharlotte on the citywide arts map with
an exhibit of matchbox art created by GLBT
community members.
Thursday brought the Charlotte premiere
The Festival kicked into high gear on Fri
day with the first performance by the 1997 art-
ists-in-residence, the Root Wy’mn Theatre
Company. Not only was the performance well-
received, but writer/director Sharon Bridgforth
and performer Sonja Parks mingled with the
crowd. This was ck riguer for the Festival, as
many artists attended a variety of events and
became, at least for a weekend, members of the
Charlotte community. Friday continued with
Kevin Fabian’s tour-de-force performance of
The Night Larry Kramer Kissed Me (which was
OutCharlotte was not just a good idea for a few
years, but a major event for now and the future.
of two queer films at the Mint Museum and
also began to reveal one of the more disturbing
facts about the GLBT community: voluntary
gender segregauon. The 7:00pm showing of The
Watermekn Woman was attended almost exclu
sively by women and the 9:00pm showing of
The Delta was dominated by men. The con
sensus is that the women got a better film, but
the men got a cute boy. That about explains it.
repeated on Saturday) and the Eggplant Faerie
Players production of Next Year in Sodom.
Much of Saturday was occupied with the
OutCharlotte Marketplace of gay owned and
operated businesses and a variety of workshops
that dealt with everything from health concerns
to parenting to religion. That evening featured
the second performance by the Root Wy’mn, a
See TRIUMPH on page 15