African American Gay Rights Essay

I can non begin to argue about African American/Hispanic LGBT, living in rude(a) York City and their civil rights without remembering the mankind outcry against black civil rights. Although the focus of this paper is on African American/Hispanic LGBT living in New York City and Their Rights to Marriage I suck up decided to start my paper of by discussing the civil rights elbow grease of the 1960s. The civil rights movement of the 1960s and the continuing struggle against race-based discrimination were rooted in the struggle against slavery.As early as the eighteen hundreds the United States legislative had laws k forthwithn as segregation laws that limited certain freedom to them. They had to live in separate neighborhood, attend separate schools, drive in the back of public buses verses in the front where Whites were African American would not dare go against these laws back then because if and when they did, they were unjustly imprisoned, beaten lynched and more for just trying to practice session human rights. In the 1960s African Americans led a struggle to remove the legally codified vestiges of slavery from our constitution and from state and local laws. near repulsive among these, were Jim Crow laws that required racial segregation African Americans had to endure all these things until The Civil Rights Movement. The modern concept of civil rights was pioneered by African Americans in their long struggle to become full citizens of the United States. From the Civil Rights Movement to the Stonewall Riots of 1969 to May 17, 2004, the LGBTQ movement has make well-nigh tremendous gains into mainstream society, a public that has not been afforded to African Americans. The African American Civil Rights Movement gave birth to many other civil rights movements in the 1960s.African Americans not only made new law, their success gave new hope. Among the many efforts sparked by the African American Civil Rights Movements were the efforts to end discrimination against women, Hispanic Americans, Native Americans, and Asian Americans, people with disabilities and lesbians and queers. any(prenominal) African American still has one more river to cross because now African American LGBT are fighting a new civil war, the fight for same sex marriage ceremony the right to be legally married. Currently, marriage has two distinct components civil marriage and the religious ritual of marriage.Mixed-gender couples can have a civil marriage without the religious ceremony/ritual. Couples can have a religious ceremony/ritual, without a civil marriage. Some couples can demand both. However, to receive the legal protections of marriage, a couple must have a civil marriage, which is the only marriage that can be addressed by courts or legislatures. The LBGT believe that the rights and legal protections of civil marriage that are launchn to mixed-gender couples and families should also be extended to couples and families who are headed by same-gender c ouples.These include the rights of survivorship, inheritance, insurance, joint income tax filing, and a myriad of rights that many mixed-gender couples take for granted. For African American LGBT, state regulation has been particularly harsh. State sodomy law has had a way of preventing LGBT from acquiring some of the rights they are entitle to. Today, fewer than half the state has sodomy laws. LGBT recognizes New York City for being the birth place for many modern gay movements however, New York has not yet passed any law giving LGBT legal protection and political support, (right to marriage being on of them).New York State gay rights bill, maiden introduced in 1971, still has not become law. While other states, like Vermont has established civil unions for LGBT, New York has not. Andy Humm writes that the biggest gay-related debate throughout the country right now is over government sanction of same-sex elationships. Vermont has gone the furthest, establishing civil unions for ga y couples that confer almost all of the rights to which a married man and woman are entitled, though stopping short of full legal marriage.New Yorkers may travel to Vermont for the civil ceremony as of July 1, but there is some question as to what legal weight it will carry back home. The federal government enacted the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) in 1996 when it looked as if Hawaii might give same-sex couples marriage licenses. It barred federal recognition of legal same-sex marriages performed in any state and gave the other states the right not to honor such a contract.xxxii states have passed laws barring recognition of same-sex marriages performed in other states, even though no state or nation allows gay couples to obtain a marriage license. (Holland will likely be the first in 2001. ) A New York version of the Defense of Marriage Act is pending in Albany, but has not had a vote in either chamber. Bibliography Diane Silver et al. , The New Civil War The Lesbian and Gay Strug gle For Civil Rights (New York New York1997), 25-26 Andy Humm, The State of gay rights in New York, Available http//www. gothamgazette. com/iotw/gayrights/ (Accessed May 16, 2005).