Ireland's 'Harvey Milk' visits San Francisco

Senator David Norris, founder of the Campaign for Homosexual Law Reform and the first openly gay person to be elected to public office in Ireland, swung through California this week during a visit arranged by the U.S.-Ireland Alliance, a nonprofit group focused on improving ties between the countries.

A member of the Anglican Church, his visit came a week after the religious denomination's American wing, the Episcopal Church, voted to end a moratorium on electing openly gay or lesbian bishops and decided to allow local parishes to bless same-sex weddings or unions as it develops a church-wide policy by 2012. Norris praised both decisions and denounced conservative members of the church for opposing the measures.

"Thank God for America and thank God for the wonderful Gene Robinson," said Norris, referring to the openly gay Episcopal bishop from New Hampshire whose elevation in 2003 caused a worldwide upheaval within the church. "Others are too cowardly to grow up or tell the truth about human sexuality."

He also dismissed fears that the pro-gay policies would further split the worldwide Anglican Communion in two and said people within the church should not shy from calling out conservative African bishops, such as Jasper Akinola, the current Anglican Primate of the Church of Nigeria, for fear they will be labeled racists.

"He is an ignorant beast but people are afraid to say it for fear of the racism charge," said Norris. "It is a visionary thing the American church is doing here."

He blamed the church for being "behind a lot of the discrimination" LGBT people face and said it "needs to be faced up to" by those in power or in the pews. Since the 1960s, Norris has followed his own advice, championing the cause of LGBT rights within Irish society as well as the country's legal system and government.

He survived bombing attempts on a disco and cultural center in Dublin that he helped found and run, and he began representing men arrested for cruising in the city's public parks.

"We won so many cases they stopped prosecuting them," he said.

Norris, 65, assumed office in Ireland's Senate in March of 1987, where he represents The University of Dublin, Trinity College. He not only broke through the country's glass ceiling for out politicians but also was the first openly gay person elected to a seat in a national government body.

For his achievements he is often dubbed the "Harvey Milk of Ireland," though Norris told the Bay Area Reporter it is a moniker used only in America and not in Europe.

"I have only heard that here," said Norris, who addressed an audience of 75 people gathered at a ballroom in the Sir Francis Drake Hotel in San Francisco's Union Square Tuesday, July 21. "It would be a gross presumption for me to say that."

But Norris does see similarities between himself and Milk, as they both were "ordinary men" who went on to do extraordinary things in the fight for civil rights.

During his talk Norris choked up when he recalled watching the Oscar-winning movie Milk, about Milk's rise to power in San Francisco during the 1970s when his election to a seat on the city's Board of Supervisors in 1977 made him the first out gay politician in a major U.S. city. Norris said he was overcome with emotion when the film showed real news footage of a candlelight march the night Milk was assassinated in 1978.

"The river of light from the candles was the most wonderful thing," said Norris, who said he was stranded at a New York airport the morning of Milk's death because his host, a local politician, and his staff had known Milk and was in such shock at his passing that they forgot to pick him up when he landed.

The reason for Norris' trip was to do research for his landmark case against the Irish government and its anti-sodomy laws. He sued the Irish attorney general in an effort to decriminalize homosexuality in Ireland but lost both at the country's High Court and on appeal with its Supreme Court.

"I thought we should take the law on. My family had been there for 2,000 years. I would be damned if I would be pushed out because I was a puff," said Norris. "I wanted to blow the veil of silence off of this."

Undaunted, Norris then filed suit in the European Court of Human Rights, and in 1988, the court ruled in his favor, finding Ireland in contravention of the European Convention on Human Rights. His attorney was Mary Robinson, who later became Ireland's president. Ireland's sodomy laws were finally repealed in 1993.

He said his battle had "nothing to do with sex, it has to do with justice."

More recently, he tried in vain to pass a civil partnership bill by the Irish government that would bestow legal rights to same-sex couples. Norris is now pressing ahead on winning full civil marriage for LGBT people in Ireland. A lesbian couple has also sued the government to have their Canadian marriage be lawfully recognized.

Asked about the likelihood of seeing Irish same-sex couples win marriage rights, Norris sounded optimistic.

"I think it is coming," he said. "They bless animals, bombs and tractors, it won't hurt them to bless a few dykes."

He credited San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom's decision in 2004 to wed same-sex couples in helping to educate people on the issue and see it as not just about the LGBT community.

"Your mayor is not gay but he opened up the idea of marriage. People see the issue now as a human rights issue and not as a narrow one" that only affects LGBT people, said Norris.

Newsom's LGBT liaison Alex Randolph presented Norris with a pin of the city and a certificate of recognition on behalf of the mayor. Openly gay State Senator Mark Leno (D-San Francisco) returned to town from Sacramento to bestow Norris with a proclamation from the state Legislative body.

"I am impressed with the history of Senator Norris and his taking on an entire country, which is no small battle," said Leno, adding that Harvey Milk is the "David Norris of America."