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Stonewall Book Club Chat Transcript

When New York police officers raided the Stonewall Inn on June 29, 1969, they did not expect much resistance. Raids on such bars were common occurances; Stonewall had already been raided once that week. But on this particular night, police officers were met with a hostility that eventually erupted into several nights of riots. Those riots, which took place thirty-five years ago this month, are now known as the beginning of the modern gay rights movement.

On June 18, Gotham Gazette held an online chat with David Carter, author of the new book Stonewall: The Riots that Sparked the Gay Revolution. Read an edited transcript below.


Gotham Gazette:
Welcome to Gotham Gazette's online book chat. With us today is David Carter, author of Stonewall: The Riots that Sparked the Gay Revolution. Good afternoon, Mr. Carter.

David Carter
Good afternoon, everyone. Thanks for having me.

GG:
Why did you decide to write a book about the Stonewall Riots?

Carter:
The Stonewall Riots are the watershed event in gay history for they changed the course of the movement for gay civil and human rights by making its success possible. The riots did this by transforming the small "homophile movement" into a mass movement by leading directly to the birth of the "gay liberation movment". In spite of the event being so important, there was no full treatment of it.

Moreover, the lengthiest account that had been written, Martin Duberman's Stonewall, did not resolve the various controversies surrounding the Stonewall Riots.

DAVID CARTER'S STONEWALL

GG:
What new material did you undercover in working on your book?

Carter:
Well, quite a lot. That the riots occurred for many specific causes, that it was not a random event as everyone, including myself, had believed. That a lesbian did play a key role in making the riots break out.

That the leading fighters in the riots were not transgendered men but homeless gay street youth. And that the police raided the Stonewall because of a blackmail operation that was being done using a prostitution ring, run by Ed Murphy, manager of the Stonewall Inn. The ring had ensnared J. Edgar Hoover earlier and that was why Murphy operated with impunity.

Andy Humm:
Tell us what J. Edgar Hoover had to do with the Stonewall Riots.

Carter:
Well, Murphy ran a national blackmail ring that victimized gay men. After he had gotten Hoover as a client, he had his photo taken with Hoover. Murphy had a long criminal record before the blackmail operation was exposed. I found a former prostitute who used to work in part out of the Stonewall Inn. He said he had survived by having a photo of himself with Ed Murphy.

And in the early 1990s, two detectives who had investigated the ring that was exposed in 1966 came forward and said that the ring had victimized Hoover, and that they had seen documents implicating Hoover as a victim of the ring, including photos of Hoover and his lover, Clyde Tolson.

After the FBI joined the blackmail operation, those documents disappeared.

Carter:
Seymour Pine told me that he was told that bonds on the streets of Europe had been traced to depository houses here in New York. He said he was told that the bonds had been stolen by the mob pressuring employees of Wall Street depository houses. And he was told that evidence indicated a possible link to the Stonewall Inn, and that he was ordered to shut the club down.

He did not know the information about Hoover.

NEW YORK IN 1969

GG:
Could Stonewall have only happened in New York City?

Carter:
Yes, of that I am certain. For example, the fact that this city had the largest gay ghetto in the US, had the most repressive police practices against gay men in the 1960s, and that that ghetto was located in one of America's most bohemian districts, and had the largest gay club of the 1960s were factors unique to New York.

GG:
You write that while New York had the largest gay population in the United States, it also had the country's most repressive laws and enforcement practices. Why was that?

Carter:
I'm not sure why that was, I have not investigated the history of that. But powerful antivice societies were active in New York long before Stonewall. George Chauncy, author of Gay New York, thinks in part it was a reaction to so many immigrants who arrived and, I believe, did not come from countries with a Puritanical heritage, and were changing the mores of the city.

Amir Bahadori
But don't you think that the liberation movement would have happened eventually, with or without Stonewall?

Carter:
Well, I think it is very difficult to answer "what if" questions. I think the movement would eventually have changed, but I think it is impossible to say how. But we know that Stonewall led directly to the Gay Liberation Front and its various offspring, which in some ways similar to the West Coast militancy, was in some ways different.

Humm:
The gay movement has been around continuously since about 1950, What was so different about Stonewall that it is the event that is celebrated on gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered pride day each June?

Carter:
Well, I think that is for several reasons. First, because while there had been resistance to police oppression before, this was the first massive and sustained resistance. Second of all, it led directly to the creation of the gay liberation movement, so it made an immediate change.

It may be hard to understand this now, but many people sensed the huge difference they felt at the time. For example, only a month after Stonewall, it was already officially commemorated with a rally and march. Only two weeks after the Riots, protestors marching around the Women's House of Detention on July 14 marched over to the Stonewall Inn afterwards to commemorate it.

It had to be pretty special to be commemorated 2 weeks later and then a month later! But that's how stirred up people were. They sensed a tremendous breakthrough, a different energy, a different consciousness.

Claude Summers
Yes, I certainly remember when I read about the riots a week or so after they took place that something historical had happened.

Carter:
But, again, all this might just be a footnote to history if some prescient people had not realized that the window of opportunity would shut, and that it was important to do something significant with that energy. They did so by creating the Gay Liberation Front.

That's why I devote an entire chapter of my book to the capturing of that energy, which I title "Seizing the Moment." It was a critical moment.

NEW YORK TODAY: LEADING OR FOLLOWING?

Summers:
I am struck that the Stonewall Riots inspired the introduction of the first civil rights bill for gay men and lesbians, but that the legislation was not adopted until 1986. Why did it take so long? By 1986 most other major American cities had adopted gay and lesbian rights bills.

Carter:
I don't know the history of that in detail, but apparently the tactics the gay liberation movement used deeply offended Tom Cuite, head of the City Council. He succeeded in bottling up the bill forever; it was only after he left the City Council that the bill passed.

Humm:
The bill took so long because New York City, contrary to popular belief, is far from liberal, especially in the boroughs outside Manhattan.

Tom Cuite promised the Cardinal he would not let the bill pass on his watch and he was true to his word. Peter Vallone, the Speaker elected in 1986, was not a supporter of the bill, but agreed to let it out of committtee. It passed 21-14 in 1986.

Claude Summers
The failure to adopt a gay rights bill shifted the center of gravity of the movement from New York City to the west coast, especially San Francisco, which early on elected gay and lesbian officials. That seems to me to have created a curious situation, where our "gayest" city, at least in terms of population, did not lead the movement.

Carter:
San Francisco has often been the leader. Before Stonewall, the movement there was much more militant there than it was on the East Coast.

Humm:
But why do you think that New York is now behind several other states in advancing rights for gay couples? Vermont has civil unions, Massachusetts has same-sex marriage, Califormia has domestic partnerships. What's up here?

Carter:
Well, Andy, you probably have your hand more on the pulse on that question than I do! It may have a lot to do with New York being much more conservative than people believe. It's probably at least in part the result of the Catholic Church's powerful lobby here.

Humm:
And the Conservative Party. There may even be a vote on a bill banning same-sex marriage in the Senate next week in Albany, though the Assembly says it will not take it up.

Carter:
The mood here sometimes feels a bit moribund.

GG:
Are the lives of gay people in New York City still significantly different from those of gay people elsewhere in the country?

Carter:
I think so. I think it's mainly the difference between being in a large city and being in a small or medium-sized city. But it's also wonderful that New York has so much to offer its gay citizens in terms of cultural institutions and political organizations. It's possible to lead a very full life here because of that: movies, dances, outings, political work, as well as the feeling of being in a gay neighborhood -- very empowering.

But it is amazing how the success of the movement is spreading. I was talking to my boyfriend on the phone last night. He is from New Bedford, MA, and he told me that they have the gay rainbow flag up on the flag pole in front of the courthouse, between the US and state flags. Try to imagine that just ten years ago!

GG:
But as far as concrete political protections, are there areas where New York remains out in front of other areas in the country?

Carter:
Well, I think New York was among the first very large cities to have a law outlawing transgender discrimination. But unfortunately we tend to follow politically instead of leading.

Humm:
David, that is not so. Minneapolis and Washington covered transgendered people in the 1970s. New York is late to that and still does not do it on the state level.

Carter:
Yes, Andy, I know there were other cities before us: that is why I said "among the first" and "very large cities."

Still, I think it is important when the nation's largest city does this. Especially as we have probably more transgendered people here. That is, transgendered people often come here so they can have the protection of anonymity and to find a common culture.

I also think we tend to lead more in cultural terms, which are also very important for our lives.

Summers
Will the City Council override Mayor Bloomberg's veto of the bill requiring companies doing business with the city to provide domestic partner benefits?

Carter:
They say that they have the votes to do so and will do so. I certainly hope they will.

Humm:
But Bloomberg is also threatening to go to court to prevent implementation of the law.

Carter:
Do you think he has a chance of prevailing in court?

Humm:
San Francisco's law survived intact. The one in Portland Maine had a few problems. Council lawyers think they've got it covered here.

BACKLASH

GG:
Has there been a violent backlash due to the increasingly public debate over political protections for gay people?

Carter:
To some extent, but recently I feel that there is much more acceptance. The homophile movement analyzed that gay people had three strikes against them: the law made them criminal; medicine said we were mentally ill; and the church said we were sinners.

Well, since a year ago, the law as well as psychiatry are on our side. And much progress has been made in changing the minds of many theologians.

I think we'll have an explosion of progress.

Humm:
But the Gay and Lesbian Anti-Violence Project found a 43% increase in anti-gay attacks for the second half of last year. They see it as a push-back against gains.

Carter:
I agree, Andy: the sad price of progress.

THE LEGACY OF STONEWALL

GG:
On Sunday, June 27, the gay rights parade in Greenwich Village will mark the 35th anniversary of the Stonewall Riots. What will the march be like 35 years from now?

Carter:
Well, I feel that today it is too much of a party, there is too little political consciousness in the march. It's not right to simply party when we don't have so many of our fundamental rights. We don't even have a federal civil rights law of any kind.

So I trust we'll have all of our rights 35 years from now, and then it'll be okay to have one big party. But I still hope that even then, in the midst of the partying, that our history will be remembered and celebrated.

Humm:
Maybe we'll stop welcoming politicians like Clinton, Schumer, and Bloomberg who do not support equal rights for us -- even though they're OK on some issues.

Carter:
I agree absolutely, Andy! I think the march should be held in support of specific legal changes, and that to march in the commemoration, politicians should have to state publicly that they support those changes.

And no politician should be allowed to join the march after St. Patrick's Cathedral. Allowing them to do so is an act of cowardice on our part, and shows a lack of respect for ourselves.

GG:
Okay, we have time for one last question.

Humm:
How did writing this book change your outlook on the lesbian and gay community and the movement?

Carter:
Well, it made me wish that we used more militant tactics more often. Gay Activists Alliance was so artful and so effective at that.

Humm:
I cover activism here and yes, it is pretty tame.

Carter:
It made me feel that we were extremely fortunate that the riots happened and that something wonderful came out of them, an explosion of the movement. It made me wish that more people, gay and nongay were aware of our history and how fascinating and rich it is.

I wish more people saw it as part of just civil rights history and American history.

Humm:
Amen to that.

Carter:
And it made me realize how powerful culture can be as a foundation for a political identity and for our identity as a people: that is, so much of the foundation of the riots lay in music, and dance and how they created community. If the Stonewall had not been a dance bar, I don't know that the riots would have happened.

That's something Allen Ginsberg loved to talk about: the power of culture. He loved to quote Plato: "When the mode of the music changes, the walls of the city shake." And this time, the Stone Wall shook, we can say!

GG:
Okay, we've run out of time. Thank you Mr. Carter, for participating, and thank you everyone else. A transcript will be available shortly, and you can continue to discuss this issue on our message board

Carter:
Thanks so much for having me, and thank you all for your questions.

GG:
Mr. Carter will be speaking at Barnes and Noble bookstore at 675 6th Avenue this Tuesday, June 22. See our calendar for more details.

Gotham Gazette's Reading NYC Book club is now reading Park and the People by Roy Rosenweig and Elizabeth Blackmar, which Library Journal referred to as "a masterpiece combining the story of the park, the history of New York, city and state politics, and the people of the city...a rare combination of scholarship and readable text." Ms. Blackmar will join us on Wednesday, June 30 to discuss the book. The meeting is at Borders bookstore at 100 Broadway, from 6 PM to 7 PM. Please send an email to books@gothamgazette.com if you plan to attend.

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