tebtuary 5.1999
urmmnews
I
er suit says Junior League, tai
lored and classy. Her words leave
no doubt that she is bright yet
still accessible in a “just folks”
way. Her hair resembles that of a
windswept jock. Tammy Baldwin is some pack
age.
“Never doubt that a small group of thought
ful, committed citizens can change the world.
Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has,” says
Baldwin, quoting the late Margaret Mead.
It was the mantra of Baldwins congressional
campaign, and Meads words were emblazoned
upon the wall of the campaign office so nobody
would forget.
And no one did, which may be
the reason Baldwin, 36, snagged a
victory— and a place in history—
this past November, when she
became the first openly gay nonin
cumbent elected to the U .S.
House of Representatives. (Others
have come out after their elections
to Congress.) She is also the first
woman Wisconsin voters have
sent to Washington, D.C.
The Democrat represents a dis
trict that includes the Madison
area, the place where she was
raised and still lives.
She gushes an enthusiasm
about the lakes, the hills and peo
ple of her home region.
“I’m there because I want to
be,” she says.
Her one stint away was for
school. Baldwin ended up at Smith
College, situated in Northampton, Mass., a
community known for its preponderance of les
bians.
She came out as a lesbian in her junior year.
“My college classmates were wonderful, just
completely supportive," she says.
Still, Baldwin didn’t tell her family until she
returned to Madison to attend law school.
“I was a very, very lucky person, both in
terms of how old and how mature I was when I
came out, and the fact that my friends and fam
ily were absolutely amazing,” she says.
Acceptance anxiety returned when she ran
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L esbian in the H ouse
Tammy Baldwin charts new territory with her win as an out lesbian
for a county council seat at the age of 24, while
she was still in law school.
“I remember vividly the night before the first
newspaper article was coming out, and being
terrified again of what was going to happen,” she
recounts. However, the sky did not fall during
the eight years she served on the council.
by Bob Roehr
had just read about her in his morning newspa
per. “The remarkable part of what he had to say
was, ‘I feel differently about myself today,’ ” she
says, adding, “I get emotional every time I think
about that because it was the first time I had a
glimpse of how powerful the symbolism truly
is.... It’s important not to forget those
moments.”
But Baldwin acknowledges that not every
one is pleased by the prospect of a high profile
lesbian.
“I’m never going to convince those hateful
people,” she says. “The people I’m going to
reach are our allies and those in the middle.... I
think that we will be most successful when we
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“But the state media made a lot
of my election to the state Assem
bly [in 19931,” she says.
The mainstream press ran sto
ries that screamed: “Out Lesbian
Elected to the State Legislature,”
and “First and Only Openly Gay or Lesbian Per
son to be Sworn In."
Upon her election to the Legislature, Bald
win recalls a poignant phone call from a man
who had “a youthful sounding voice that was
very shaky.”
According to Baldwin, the fellow told her he
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do our best to turn the other cheek and keep on
with our work.”
Baldwin takes pride in having successfully
sponsored a campaign finance reform law while
she was a state legislator, as well as having
played a part in defeating her state’s equivalent
of the Defense of Marriage Act.
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Baldwin offers thanks to her supporters.
“W hen I was first elected to the county
board in 1 9 8 6 ,1 attended a conference of open
ly gay elected and appointed officials. There
were 14 of us, including one from Great Britain.
Now we are pushing toward 200," she says.
“There are not nearly as many glass ceilings to
shatter.”
Baldwin says the Gay and Lesbian Victory
Fund, founded in 1991, played “an absolutely
key role” in making that happen. “They started
thinking about what ingredients needed to be in
place” in terms of resources, training and skills
to help elect openly gay and lesbian candidates
at every level of government, she explains.
“What we learned...is that the electorate
was absolutely ready for candidates who come
prepared and well qualified to address their
issues,” she says.
Baldwin laughs in acknowledging that she
was the fund’s “poster child” in 1993, the year
she stepped up from the county council to
statewide office. And she jokes that with this
last election she has become a “second genera
tion” poster child for the group.
She also credits the Human Rights Cam
paign for endorsing her very early in the election
cycle, when she was running against other
strongly pro-gay candidates in the congressional
primary. (H RC lobbyist Kris Pratt is now Bald
win’s legislative director.)
In the nation’s capital, Baldwin is trying to
get to know her new colleagues. She also says
her principal legislative goal is “passing a uni
versal health care bill {and) making sure that
every citizen in this country has access to health
care.”
She made that mission the centerpiece of her
campaign.
“But I’m a pragmatist and I know that it is
going to take a long time, and that there is a lot
of political groundwork that needs to be laid
first,” she says.
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