Frank Kameny and the U.S. Homophile Movement: Reactionary or Prophet of Gay Liberation?

The homophile phase of the movement for lesbian and gay civil rights is often described as if in almost total contrast to that phase of the movement the Stonewall Uprising engendered, the gay liberation movement. Few persons are portrayed as better exemplifying the homophile movement than Dr. Franklin Kameny, founder of the Mattachine Society of Washington.  But how typical of the homophile movement was Kameny, who was the main protagonist for discarding the research and education approach of the national Mattachine Society for an approach modeled on the black civil rights movement? And how different was the homophile phase of the movement from the phase that followed it? Both phases had militants as well as gradualists; proponents of conformity and of a specific same-sex identity; and those who argued for joining with other political movements in a common front and those who opposed such alliances. 

And what is the historic meaning of the career of Frank Kameny, who is often put forward as a contrasting figure to the gay liberation movement? This paper will argue that it was only with Stonewall that the LGBT movement caught up with Kameny, for it was Kameny who wrote the first US Supreme Court brief arguing that homosexuals should have equal rights; organized the first public demonstration by a gay organization; coined the first popular progay slogan; was the main force behind the declassification of homosexuality as a mental illness; began the contemporary battle to overturn the US military’s policy barring lesbians and gay men by putting Sergeant Leonard Matlovich’s story in the public eye; convinced the US government to reverse its policy of refusing to hire gay citizens; and cofounded the nation’s two leading gay political organizations, the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force and the Human Rights Campaign.