The 2007 state legislative season has been the most productive in the history of the GLBT rights movement. For the first time in our history more than half of the U.S. population will live in jurisdictions that outlaw discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, according to an analysis of Census data and current laws by the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force. In addition, nearly 40 percent of the population now live in jurisdictions that protect transgender people from discrimination, a sevenfold increase since 2000. And one-fifth of all Americans will live in states that offer same-sex couples broad rights under state law. The 2006 elections and years of dogged work at the grassroots level were responsible for the surge in legislation.
Since Jan. 1, 2007, the legislatures in four states have passed nondiscrimination laws. Three of those states—Iowa, Oregon, and Colorado—moved to extend protections to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people, and the Vermont Legislature passed a bill amending its existing nondiscrimination laws to include transgender people. As a result, the percentage of the U.S. population living in jurisdictions protecting lesbian, gay, and bisexual people from discrimination will rise to 52 percent, crossing the halfway mark for the first time. (The laws of Iowa, Oregon, and Vermont prohibit discrimination in employment, housing and public accommodations, among other categories; Colorado’s law covers employment only.)
Protections for transgender people have grown even more quickly over the last decade than those for lesbian, gay and bisexual people because of a commitment in the GLBT movement to insist that they be included in new nondiscrimination laws and added to existing laws. When the four state discrimination laws go into effect, 37 percent of the population will live in jurisdictions that protect transgender people from discrimination.
In the national arena, in May the U.S. House of Representatives passed by a vote of 237 to 180 a hate crimes bill containing explicit protections for transgender people. And there is widespread expectation that both houses of Congress will take up the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) before the end of this calendar year. What’s more, the ENDA bill was amended to prohibit discrimination on the basis of gender identity and expression.
Since the 2006 election, legislatures in three states—New Jersey, New Hampshire, and Oregon—have passed civil unions 
or domestic partnerships laws that grant same-sex couples the same rights and responsibilities accorded to married couples under state law. As of this writing, around a fifth of the U.S. population will soon live in states that offer broad rights to same-sex couples (namely California, Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Oregon, and Vermont). Other jurisdictions—Washington state, Hawaii, and the District of Columbia—have passed laws that give significant but not comprehensive rights to domestic partners. Meanwhile, a host of other state legislatures are poised to take up the issue.
Oregon’s new law is a particularly satisfying turnaround from 2004, when voters approved a constitutional amendment banning the recognition of same-sex marriage by a margin of 57 percent to 43 percent, the narrowest margin among the thirteen states that approved an anti-marriage measure that year. In Oregon in 2006, then-House Speaker Karen Minnis was singularly responsible for blocking nondiscrimination and family recognition legislation bills. With Democrats taking control of that chamber, Minnis has since lost her leadership position.
The results of the 2006 election played a pivotal role in four of the six states that passed nondiscrimination or family protection laws since December, namely Colorado, Iowa, New Hampshire, and Oregon. Before the election, Democrats held control of both houses of the state legislature in three of the states taking pro-GLBT action: Vermont, Colorado, and New Jersey. As a result of the November elections, however, Democrats picked up control of both houses in the other three states: Iowa, Oregon, and New Hampshire. In Colorado, Democrats strengthened their control of the Legislature, and Democrat William Ritter succeeded Republican William Owens, who had twice vetoed the nondiscrimination bill, as governor.
The change in control of the state legislatures was due to Democratic gains nationwide, as well as specific work to elect pro-GLBT state legislators spearheaded by Colorado philanthropist Tim Gill. Although it took Democratic control to move the bills, each passed with Republican support (although Colorado’s employment nondiscrimination bill passed with only one Republican voting for it).
Matt Foreman is executive director of The Gay & Lesbian Task Force.
