The New York Times

February, Thursday, February 12, 1998

Maine Voters Repeal a Law on Gay Rights

By Carey Golberg

Augusta, Me., Feb. 11 - In a landmark victory Christian conservatives, Maine voters have narrowly chosen to make their state the first in the nation to repeal its law protecting gay men and lesbians from discrimination, according to all-but-official referendum, results published today.

Casting ballots on Tuesday in a single-issue "people's veto" plebiscite nearly 52 percent of voters backed the repeal despite pleas from the state's popular independent Governor and almost a half-million dollars in campaign spending by gay, lesbian and civil rights advocates. The new law they struck down had

barred discrimination against gay men and lesbians in employment, housing, credit and public accommodations.

The repeal is "a clear victory for people of faith," said Randy Tate, executive director of the national Christian Coalition, which helped finance and organize the Maine repeal campaign. "The American people rejected the notion of special rights based on sexual activity behind closed doors."

The losing side, which spent an estimated five times as much as the victors, described the repeal as more of a triumph for get-out-the-vote expertise and circumstance. They cited low turnout - only about 30 percent voted - along with the difficulty of running a campaign during last month's devastating ice storm and of drawing supporters out for a single-issue vote in February when the threat to gay rights did not at first appear great.

"The national Christian Coalition came in and they turned out every single one of their voters," said Joe Cooper, spokesman for Maine Won't Discriminate, the campaign to defend the gay-rights law. "We were relying on the whole state of Maine to come together as a community. Polls showed we had the backing of two-thirds of the state."

In fact, other polls have shown that the anti-discrimination laws similar to Maine's, which exist in 10 other states, may be somewhat vulnerable to repeal when their fate is determined by public opinion rather than the legislatures that passed them.

A national survey done by Newsweek in mid-1997 found that when people were asked to assess the amount of effort devoted to protecting gay rights, 23 percent thought more was needed and 26 percent thought the amount was correct, but 42 percent thought such efforts had gone too far. And in 1992, Colorado voters approved a referendum that barred localities from passing gay rights ordinances, though the measure was later overturned by the Supreme Court.

Last year, legislatures in Maine and New Hampshire passed gay rights laws, but a gay-rights referendum failed in Washington State. In Maine, both sides say, there is likely to be a political pause now as gay rights advocates contemplate countermoves that could include efforts at another referendum or another bill in the legislature.

Both the advocates and the opponents of gay-rights laws say they cannot predict which state could become the focus of the battle next. No other state is contemplating a Maine-style repeal, they said, but Maryland and Iowa are considering passing laws that protect gay rights.

"It's kind of going both ways," said Rebecca Isaacs, political director for the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force. "People are more and more organized at the grassroots level in support of civil rights and tolerance, but you have the same activists on the right wing who make the gay and lesbian community their target for attacks on a regular basis. It's the same folks, over and over whether it's in Oregon or Maine,

"They can scare people and raise a lot of money," she said. Both sides also agreed that the issue would continue to simmer.

"I really think this is going to be an ongoing controversy well into the next century," said Gary Bauer, president of the conservative Family Research Council in Washington, which contributed about $40,000 to the Maine repeal campaign. "There is increasing cultural acceptance of homosexuals and support among political elites for the gay-rights agenda, but at the grassroots level among average Americans there Is a tremendous amount of resistance."

Even before its surprise outcome, the Maine referendum was particularly interesting, some campaigners and analysts say, in that the Christian conservative groups that spearheaded the repeal drive made no effort whatever to soft-pedal their belief that homosexuality is immoral and therefore to be actively discouraged. One television commercial even featured several men who said they were former homosexuals who had been saved by Christ.

"It feels good that we've done it without being clever," said Michael Heath, executive director of the 100 year-old Christian Civic League of Maine. "We've been right out front about what we believe, which some people said was not very politically astute of us.

"We said homosexuality is immoral and it's wrong," Mr. Heath said. He estimated that his side had spent $120,000 to $150,000 on the campaign.

The Christian Coalition of Maine distributed tens of thousands of leaflets that included hot-button questions like: "Do you want to send your children or grandchildren to Day Cares, Pre-Schools and Schools that are forced to hire homosexuals?"

On the other side, Maine Won't Discriminate ran television commercials featuring Gov. Angus King informing viewers that though he could not tell them how to vote, he simply thought it was unfair for people to lose their jobs because they were gay. In a quotation used on one leaflet, he said, "We're neighbors in Maine. We take each other as we are and we don't discriminate."

That wording may have been unfortunate; already, said Christian Potholm, a professor of government at Bowdoin College who has been polling in Maine for 25 years, perhaps 70 percent of Maine residents believe the state has no problem with discrimination against gay men and lesbians. That could have kept people who are otherwise sympathetic to gay and lesbian rights at home, he said.

Overall, Dr. Potholm said, Maine is no more intolerant than other states, and given a well-run gay rights campaign would likely split into two camps, with 55 percent supporting gay rights and 45 percent against