The Libertarian Editorials (July/Aug. 1979)

Night of fury

It is difficult to overestimate the importance of what has gone on here in San Francisco in the past few weeks: the coming of age of the gay movement in this country, the coming of age of the Libertarian Party and the libertarian movement in this city. For those unfortunate enough to live somewhere other than in San Francisco, we should relate the events, and assess their meaning.

It was an explosion of rage, anger, and indignation. On November 27, 1978, Dan White, a prominent San Francisco ex-policeman, -fireman, and -County Supervisor committed two acts of cold-blooded murder. It was a political squabble: White was a reactionary, emotional, homophobic, bigoted man who had resigned his seat on San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors in a huff. He wasn’t making enough money, and the difficulties of starting a small business on the side were draining him and leading him into conflicts with his wife. A few days after he resigned, he changed his mind and tried to get San Francisco mayor George Moscone to reappoint him to his then vacant seat. Moscone initially agreed, but —as anti-White public opinion began to materialize—he changed his mind. Working against the bigot White was Harvey Milk, the supervisor who was probably the most famous gay political figure in America. Milk was a liberal who had most of the faults of political liberals, but he was deeply loved by the gay community, and his benevolent warmth made him a symbol of the freedom and openness which gay people have so deeply longed for. It was the most natural thing in the world for Harvey Milk to oppose Dan White’s reappointment, and the struggle was naturally a bitter one. Dan White lost. Mayor George Moscone, one of the gay community’s best friends in this city and a voice for tolerance, announced his intention to appoint someone else to fill the vacancy. Dan White was stunned. On November 27, 1978, he pocketed his carefully loaded service revolver, along with enough bullets to empty his gun once and load it again. He made his way into San Francisco’s City Hall through a basement window, to evade the metal detector in the City Hall’s lobby, and approached the office of the mayor. Confronting Moscone, White became bitter, pulled out his gun, and blasted the mayor three times. Then, in a coup de grace, he carefully fired two more bullets into the back of Moscone’s head, execution-style. White then calmly reloaded his revolver, walked over to the office of Harvey Milk, and finished him off in the same way: two bullets to the body, two more in the back of the head. Then White waltzed off to church, turning himself in to his friends the police a few hours later, admitting what he had done in an interrogation which must surely be the mildest ever seen in a murder case. But White’s friends in the police department obviously didn’t want to upset the poor man.

The trial became something of a media event in San Francisco. The defense, as Leslee Newman points out in the editorial that follows, argued that White suffered from depression and “diminished capacity,” and brought in four psychiatrists to testify on his behalf. The defense attorney made a conscious effort to keep gays off the jury, preferring instead people of a straight, white, middle-class “background” like White himself. And they let him get away with murder. The afternoon of Monday, May 21, they brought in a verdict of guilty of voluntary manslaughter, on the grounds of “diminished capacity,” and let the assassin off with a slap on the wrist—a verdict which is likely to see Dan White out on the streets again in less than five years.

That night the city exploded. What began as a peaceful march of protest, largely by the gay community, ended in outrage and violence as thousands of gay people, reaching city hall, exploded in indignation and began taking the building apart, stone by stone. Police rushed to the defense of City Hall, and a riot slashed through the area around the building: it was the worst police riot, said the editor of the Berkeley Barb, that he had seen in a decade. Cops began clubbing people at random, viciously enjoying themselves in a battle against gays. Innocent people were clubbed down when they were found standing alone. An epileptic who was a few blocks away, in no way connected with the riot, screamed that he was epileptic when police began battering him, but they continued their brutality, landing the young gay man in a hospital. “We’re going to kill you goddamn queers,” they said as they struck at him again and again. They smashed the faces of media people, breaking television cameras. The violence grew: more than a dozen police cars were burned by an angry mob which turned the cars over like so many toys. Protestors yanked parking meters out of the cement and

“The city exploded; more than a dozen police cars were burned by an angry mob which turned them over like so many toys.”

used them as battering rams, charging at City Hall with a righteous vengeance. The cops battered them again and again, and again and again the protestors charged ahead, fighting back. When the riot broke up shortly after one that morning, the police got even more deadly serious. They decided to occupy the Castro district, the San Francisco gay community of which homosexuals are fiercely and territorially proud. The police marched into Castro like an occupying army, thirsting for blood. A dozen cops broke away from the main contingent, and ran shouting “Sieg Heil” into a prominent gay bar, the Elephant Walk, there to break up furniture, club bar patrons at random, do savage violence to the people and their property, and scream about “killing the queers,” as their nightsticks crashed into bone and flesh.

Well, the “queers” would have none of it. They rose up again, this time meaning business, flooding the streets of the Castro district, and literally drove the cops out of their neighborhood. The invaders had been beaten back, and the gays who defended themselves were mighty proud that night, defiantly willing to stand up for themselves and to end their oppression, once and for all. The next night, a gigantic birthday party was held for the late Harvey Milk in the Castro area, and the streets were flooded with ten thousand gay people who felt liberated, proud, and filled with love and affection for themselves and each other. There was not a policeman to be seen, and the most glorious love-in filled the streets. Heads and voices were raised, and gay people were not about to plead any longer for their basic rights. They had a right to their own lifestyles, and no one—no one—was going to tell them otherwise.

The New Republic's Paul Robinson was almost alone among periodicals in understanding what had happened on those nights:

The riot marked a significant moment in the evolution of political awareness among homosexuals. The May 21 riot was political in two senses: first, it explicitly addressed the issue of justice, which, if we follow Plato, is the most fundamental category of political analysis. The crowd at City Hall shouted repeatedly, “We want justice.” Second, it required abstraction. The individuals who rioted, unlike those who protested police harassment at the Stonewall, a gay bar in New York City, 10 years ago, did not themselves face any immediate or tangible imposition. They had to think abstractly, indeed almost technically, to get from a verdict of voluntary manslaughter to their act of civil disobedience. Reasoning of this sort presumes that a significant group in the population has become aware not merely of its own existence, but also of its rights and power. The riot, I can’t help feeling, marks a kind of political coming of age for homosexuals in San Francisco and, vicariously, throughout the country.

Robinson concluded that “like last year’s legislative struggle over gay rights, the Dan White affair has served, paradoxically, as a vehicle for homosexual liberation. One should merely avoid underestimating the intellectual, and above all, psychological difficulties that liberation poses for heterosexuals.” Now that is an analysis.

But note something unusual here: here was a riot staged by the gay community—usually identified with liberal politics—which was aimed against a lenient verdict by the judicial system. Here was no liberal pretense, no handwringing about Dan White’s “problems,” no sobbing calls for “understanding.” Here instead was a damn strong feeling of outrage and betrayal. Some people have charged the gays with a self-interested motive here. Well of course! And what the hell is wrong with that? That night the gay community didn’t just step out of the closet, once and for all. That night gays stepped out of the liberal political constituency as well, issuing their collective declaration of independence. That night, liberals had nothing to offer them.

Libertarians did, however. It was American psychiatry which had helped get Dan White off with a slap on the wrist for his assassinations—it was the testimony of psychiatrists which convinced the jury to go for a “diminished capacity” voluntary manslaughter verdict. And the world’s leading critic of institutional psychiatry just happens to be a libertarian: Dr. Thomas Szasz, the author of The Myth of Mental Illness, The Manufacture of Madness.

Law, Liberty and Psychiatry and a host of other works. Responding quickly, San Francisco libertarians decided to bring Thomas Szasz to the city for a major rally at which he would speak out on the Dan White verdict. The idea was born simultaneously in several minds at once: Ronald Hamowy, consulting editor of Inquiry, Justin Raimondo of Students for a Libertarian Society, and others. We called Szasz, and were greeted by his virtually boyish enthusiasm for the project. He agreed to do it: to come to San Francisco Tuesday June 19, the day scheduled for Dan White’s sentencing, and speak out on the verdict.

San Francisco libertarians sprang into action. I coordinated the event, with media whiz Eric Garris, also of SLS. We plastered the city with advertising: full page ads in community and gay newspapers, public service announcements, posters, and radio commercials. Szasz appeared on countless radio and television stations, in news conferences, on talk shows, and on the evening news. Tension filled the air as the date approached: our posters and ads were everywhere. One striking poster, the work of LR art director Melanie Price, was done in stark red and black and announced “‘Dan White Got Away With Murder. American Psychiatry Helped Him to Do It.’—Thomas Szasz speaks out on the Dan White Verdict.” It had an explosive impact on everyone who saw it, and the city began to talk about the event days before it was to happen. Szasz was everywhere, espousing the libertarian viewpoint: that victimless crimes should be legalized, that people should not be victimized because of their lifestyles, and that people who do commit violent crimes deserve to be punished. Szasz also offered his simple and elegant critique of American psychiatry as “Dan White’s accomplice in crime.” “While White pulled the trigger on the gun that killed Moscone and Milk,” he said, “American psychiatry pulled the wool over the eyes of lawmakers and journalists and the public—leading to the courtroom scenario of psychiatrists lying through their teeth and having their lies legitimized by the courts as ‘expert medical testimony.’” Szasz’s charge was explosive: that first the psychiatrists go into court to get the innocent committed, and then go back into court to get the guilty off. It was the right argument at the right time, and everyone—media and public alike—seemed suddenly to understand what we had been saying all along.

The rally was an overwhelming success: nearly two thousand people crowded into a high school auditorium to hear Szasz, along with San Francisco County Supervisor Carol Ruth Silver, Libertarian Party candidate for District Attorney Bart Lee, gay libertarian activist Justin Raimondo, Eric Garris, coordinator of the Libertarian Party petition drive to abolish the San Francisco vice squad and to abolish victimless crime laws, and Ed Clark, the 1978 Libertarian Party candidate for governor of California. Non-libertarian Carol Ruth Silver kicked off the evening with lavish praise for the Libertarian Party and Students for a Libertarian Society, which had co-sponsored the event, stating openly that the libertarians were the only group today raising the important issues of our time.

At first the crowd looked to be hostile to so many libertarian speakers: they bristled a bit when the speakers were announced. But then, one by one, the speakers won them over. It was absolutely, totally clear to them that we were not there to manipulate them in any way, shape or form. We were there because we shared their anger and outrage, and had something different to say about the events that had taken place. Chairperson Christine Dorffi of the San Francisco LP made a forceful MC; Eric Garris talked about the vice squad initiative, and the crowd warmed up; Bart Lee launched into a bitter attack on the San Francisco District Attorney, who had virtually thrown the case by putting up a fantastically weak prosecution of ex-policeman White. The audience loved it. Justin Raimondo electrified the audience with a defense of the gains of May 21: this audacious person, they thought, is actually defending our right of self defense. Ed Clark delivered a moving talk on the meaning of libertarianism and its relationship to the Dan White verdict, ending in a plea for tolerance of people’s diverse lifestyles, and then presenting a rousing introduction of Thomas Szasz, who was greeted enthusiastically.

The Szasz talk—which will be printed in Inquiry magazine—was a masterpiece, written by Szasz with helpful suggestions from Inquiry’s Ralph Raico. It was Szasz at his witty, courageous and forceful best, making point after point, as the audience built up wave after wave of wild enthusiasm, breaking out dozens of times with massive applause. Watching him as a friend and admirer, I could only marvel at this man who has more courage than anyone else I know. He was awesome, brilliant, flamboyant, warm and incisive. He overwhelmed the audience, and at the end of his talk was greeted with a massive standing ovation. The audience had fallen in love with him. He fielded questions long into the night, and was surrounded by dozens of people who simply wanted to be near this delightful and loving human being. The media were awestruck by Tom Szasz and decided then and there that the libertarian movement was important.

That night, libertarianism came of age in the city of San Francisco. For days people who were at the event spoke about little else, impressed with the Libertarian Party and the libertarian movement as they had never been before. We became a force in the community, not by cynically manipulating an event, but by courageously speaking out to clear up the confusion and rage that people had felt after the verdict was announced. We shared the values of the people in San Francisco. We spoke out strongly. And we were heard. For the first time, we were heard clearly and distinctly. Suddenly, we made sense.

There is no question now that libertarianism is going to be a major force in San Francisco politics, and that our influence is going to spread very quickly over the next few years as we forcefully speak out on the issues and concerns of the American people. Our affectionate and often bemused acceptance of gay people as human beings deserving of tolerance and dignity and freedom has caused them to listen to us, and to hear us, and no one should underestimate the importance of that fact. We must now address the other concerns of other segments of Americans just as forcefully and courageously. We must speak out at every public forum, before every group, and we must rise before the most hostile audiences and make them understand the importance and fantastic beauty of our libertarian vision. There can be no stepping back from the challenge. If we take it, the results are going to resound, not for months or years, but for centuries. We are practical visionaries, and Liberty has come of age.

Bringing on the twinkies

“Whenever he felt things were not going right, he would abandon his usual program of exercise and good nutrition and start gorging himself on junk foods—Twinkies, Coca-Cola. He’d hit the chocolate, and the more he consumed, the worse he’d feel, and he’d respond to his depression by consuming ever more junk food. He just sat there before the TV, bringing on the Twinkies. He couldn’t sleep. He was tossing and turning on the couch in the living room so he wouldn’t disturb his wife in the bed. He was dazed, confused, had crying spells, became increasingly ill, and wanted to be left alone.” He told his wife not to cook; he would just munch potato chips.

There you have it—some excerpts from the testimony of psychiatrist Dr. Martin Blinder in the trial of Dan White, the former San Francisco County Supervisor who took the lives of San Francisco Mayor George Moscone and fellow Supervisor Harvey Milk last November. By commonsense standards, it’s obvious White was upset and depressed. But this psychiatric testimony convinced a jury to mitigate White’s crime from murder to voluntary manslaughter, with its accompanying lesser penalty—even though Dr. Martin Blinder, an Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at the University of California, an Assistant Professor of Law at Hastings College, and an Assistant Editor of the American Journal of Psychiatry and Law, had begun his testimony by laying a foundation for his “abhorrence of the abuse of psychiatry in the courtroom.” He told the jurors: “I think the courts, at least some aspects of the courts, tend to place psychiatry in a position where it doesn’t belong.” He went on to describe a class he teaches at Hastings College of Law in the use and abuse of psychiatry in the courtroom. Then he began to describe Dan White’s mind as confused, emotionally drained from the effects of his depression and eating habits. Blinder helped to convince the jury that White probably could not have premeditated, probably could not have deliberated, probably could not have formed the intent to kill his victims. And he wasn’t alone—Blinder was assisted by four other psychiatrists and psychologists for the defense. None of them attempted the same junk food trick, but each played on White’s stress, his tendency toward manic depression, and made excuses for his behavior. Thus he was described in further psychiatric testimony, which touched on his many fights as a teenager, as a “defender of the rights of others,” rather than as a bully. He was said to have left the San Francisco Police Department “because he didn’t get enough support from his superiors.” He was described as ambivalent about assuming marital responsibilities “because of family pressures.” He became a San Francisco Supervisor “so he could protect citizens in the streets”; he resigned because “City Hill was corrupt.” He wanted to be a free spirit, a la Jack London, yet he wanted to be a responsible citizen.

Poor Dan White. So he was in conflict. And every time things got rough—his jobs, his marriage; he turned away. He had difficulty assuming responsibility or being a witness to the facts of life. So why did he choose to return to the San Francisco Police Department after his leave of absence? Why did he choose to marry and have a child? Why did he choose to become a San Francisco Supervisor and insist that he be reappointed after his resignation of only a few days before? Poor Dan White. The psychiatrists and psychologists tried to convince the jury that he shouldn’t be held responsible for his acts, not even the killing of Moscone and Milk. He was just a victim of modern life.

Common sense should have told that jury that the whole judicial affair was really a farce. It’s too obvious that one does not just grab a gun and exactly the right amount of ammunition to load it twice, as White did on that fateful day in November, unless one has a purpose. One does not climb in through a side window of City Hall in order to avoid a metal detector, as White did, without a reason. One does not reload one’s gun between shootings, and shoot each victim separately, using the same pattern of execution—two to three bullets to the chest, and two more in the head once the victim has been felled. One does not do these things unless there is some motivation, some plan of action.

It’s not just reflex and it doesn’t happen as if in a dream, as Dan White’s psychiatrists and psychologists told the jury. Yet, Dr. Martin Blinder and his psychiatric entourage were convincing enough to make the jury believe that Dan White could not have committed the killings of Moscone and Milk in cold blood. The use of psychiatric testimony in the courtroom is making the judicial process a sham. The jury in the Dan White case were offered Dan’s Twinkies, candy bars, and chocolate, and obediently gobbled them up.

—Leslee J. Newman