Mel Boozer

{{Infobox person

|name = Mel Boozer

|image = Boozer1.jpg

|caption = Melvin "Mel" Boozer

|birth_date = {{birth date|1945|6|21|mf=yes}}

|birth_place = Washington, D.C.

|death_date = {{death date and age |1987|3|6 |1945|6|21 |mf=yes}}

|death_place = Washington, D.C.

|death_cause = AIDS-related illness

|nationality = American

|alma_mater = {{Plainlist}}

Dartmouth College (undergrad)
Yale University (Ph.D.) {{endplainlist}}

|occupation = {{Plainlist}}

Professor of sociology
LGBT rights activist
President, Gay Activists Alliance of Washington, D.C. {{endplainlist}}

|known_for = The first openly gay candidate for Vice President of the United States

}}

Melvin Boozer (June 21, 1945 – March 6, 1987){{cite web |url=https://www.washingtonblade.com/2017/02/24/honoring-contributions-audre-lorde-melvin-boozer/ |title=Honoring contributions of Audre Lorde, Melvin Boozer|newspaper=The Washington Blade|author=Lou Chibbaro Jr|date=February 24, 2017 |accessdate=November 20, 2018 }} was an American university professor and activist for African American, LGBTQ and HIV/AIDS issues. He was active in both the Democratic Party and Socialist Party USA.

Biography

Boozer grew up in Washington, D.C., where he graduated as salutatorian of his class at Dunbar High School. Boozer attended Dartmouth College on a scholarship. He entered the university in 1963, one of only three African Americans admitted that year.Sears, [https://books.google.com/books?id=wqt4krhmQrwC&pg=PA298 p. 298]. Following his graduation, he studied for a Ph.D. at Yale University before becoming a professor of sociology at the University of Maryland.Clendenin, et al., [https://books.google.com/books?id=6zRFBGTSgoUC&pg=PA419 p. 419].

In 1979, Boozer was elected president of the Gay Activists Alliance of Washington, D.C.,{{cite web |url=http://www.glaa.org/archive/2000/boozer0816.shtml |title=20 years later, GLAA remembers Mel Boozer |publisher=Gay and Lesbian Activists Alliance |accessdate=March 12, 2010 }} in which office he served for two one-year terms.{{cite web|title=1971–2007: Thirty-five years of fighting for equal rights |publisher=Gay and Lesbian Activists Alliance |url=http://www.glaa.org/resources/timeline.shtml |accessdate=January 2, 2009 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20090202124141/http://glaa.org/resources/timeline.shtml |archivedate=February 2, 2009 }} He was the first African American to serve as GAA president and became "a leading moderate voice among black gays nationally".Witt, et al., [https://books.google.com/books?id=1dw5AQAAQBAJ&pg=PT26 p. 18]. While president of the GAA, the organization won unanimous passage of the Sexual Assault Reform Act by the D.C. Council, which decriminalized sodomy and repealed solicitation laws for consenting adults. Under pressure from the Moral Majority, a Christian right lobbying group, Congress exercised its power to overturn DC acts for only the second time to repeal this change. During his leadership, the GAA also saw established the right for the GAA to lay a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknowns in Arlington National Cemetery and won a court battle with the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority for the right to place Metrobus posters reading "Someone in Your Life is Gay."

Boozer also wrote for BlackLight, the first national black gay periodical, founded by Sidney Brinkley.{{Cite web|url=https://xtramagazine.com/the-black-gay-man-who-could-have-been-the-us-vice-president-73432|title=StackPath|website=xtramagazine.com|date=2 May 2017 }}{{Cite web |url=https://ubuntubiographyproject.com/2017/06/20/boozer/ |title=Ubuntu Biography Project |access-date=2018-11-20 |archive-date=2020-09-30 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200930214852/https://ubuntubiographyproject.com/2017/06/20/boozer/ |url-status=dead }}

Boozer was nominated in 1980 for the office of Vice President of the United States by the Socialist Party USASmith, et al., [https://books.google.com/books?id=m_boGY8AUTIC&pg=PA193 p. 193] and, by petition at the convention, by the Democratic Party.Shilts, [https://books.google.com/books?id=nYs8AAAAQBAJ&pg=PT49 p. 32] He was the first openly gay person ever nominated for the office. Boozer spoke to the Democratic convention in a speech televised in prime time, calling on the party to support equality for LGBT people:

{{blockquote|Would you ask me how I dare to compare the civil rights struggle with the struggle for lesbian and gay rights? I can compare them and I do compare them, because I know what it means to be called a 'nigger' and I know what it means to be called a 'faggot,' and I understand the differences in the marrow of my bones. And I can sum up that difference in one word: none.Rutledge, [https://archive.org/details/gaydecadesfromst00rutl p. 156]}}

Boozer received 49 votes before the balloting was suspended and then-Vice President Walter Mondale was renominated by acclamation.Sears, [https://books.google.com/books?id=wqt4krhmQrwC&pg=PA389 p. 389].

In 1981, Boozer was hired by the National Gay Task Force as district director and a lobbyist. NGTF executive director Virginia Apuzzo fired him in 1983,Smith, [https://books.google.com/books?id=JEGGAAAAIAAJ&q=Boozer p. 42].Clendinen, et al., [https://books.google.com/books?id=6zRFBGTSgoUC&pg=PA491 p. 491]. replacing him with then-GAA president Jeff Levi.Clendinen, et al., [https://books.google.com/books?id=6zRFBGTSgoUC&pg=PA477 p. 477]. This had the effect of "leav[ing] the nation's oldest gay organization even whiter"Clendinen, et al., [https://books.google.com/books?id=6zRFBGTSgoUC&pg=PA495 p. 495]. and drew protests from other gay African Americans.

In 1982, he co-founded the Langston Hughes–Eleanor Roosevelt Democratic Club to advocate for black LGBT people in D.C., leading the club in 1983 and 1984.[https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/local/1987/03/10/homosexual-rights-activist-melvin-boozer-dies-at-41/77a98b28-cb6e-477f-86cb-f770a1b68c77/ The Washington Post]

Boozer died of an AIDS-related illnessClendinen, et al., pp. [https://books.google.com/books?id=6zRFBGTSgoUC&pg=PA568 568] and [https://books.google.com/books?id=6zRFBGTSgoUC&pg=PA575 575]. in March 1987 at the age of 41 in Washington, D.C.{{cite web|url=http://www.inlamagazine.com/1105/aids25/908_aidsat25_rem_group.html |title=AIDS at 25 |magazine=In LA magazine |accessdate=April 30, 2009 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20110722121414/http://www.inlamagazine.com/1105/aids25/908_aidsat25_rem_group.html |archivedate=July 22, 2011 }} Boozer is featured in a panel of the AIDS Memorial Quilt.

In June 2019, Boozer was one of the inaugural fifty American "pioneers, trailblazers, and heroes" inducted on the National LGBTQ Wall of Honor within the Stonewall National Monument (SNM) in New York City's Stonewall Inn.{{Cite web|url=https://www.metro.us/news/local-news/new-york/stonewall-inn-lgbtq-wall-honor|title=National LGBTQ Wall of Honor unveiled at Stonewall Inn|last=Glasses-Baker|first=Becca|date=June 27, 2019|website=www.metro.us|access-date=2019-06-28}}{{Cite web|url=https://sdgln.com/news/2019/06/19/national-lgbtq-wall-honor-be-unveiled-historic-stonewall-inn|title=National LGBTQ Wall of Honor to be unveiled at historic Stonewall Inn|last=SDGLN|first=Timothy Rawles-Community Editor for|date=2019-06-19|website=San Diego Gay and Lesbian News|language=en|access-date=2019-06-21}} The SNM is the first U.S. national monument dedicated to LGBTQ rights and history,{{Cite web|url=https://www.ebar.com/news/news//272833|title=Groups seek names for Stonewall 50 honor wall|website=The Bay Area Reporter / B.A.R. Inc.|language=en|access-date=2019-05-24}} and the wall's unveiling was timed to take place during the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall riots.{{Cite web|url=http://sfbaytimes.com/stonewall-50/|title=Stonewall 50|date=2019-04-03|website=San Francisco Bay Times|access-date=2019-05-25}}

Notes

References

{{cite book |last1=Cleninden |first1=Dudley |author2=Adam Nagourney |author2-link=Adam Nagourney |year=1999 |title=Out for Good: The Struggle to Build a Gay Rights Movement in America |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6zRFBGTSgoUC |location=New York |publisher=Simon & Schuster |isbn=0-684-81091-3 }}
{{cite book |last1=Rutledge |first1=Leigh |year=1992 |title=The gay decades: from Stonewall to the present — the people and events that shaped gay lives |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FpKHAAAAIAAJ |location=New York |publisher=Penguin |isbn=0-452-26810-9 }}
{{cite book |last1=Sears |first1=Thomas James |year=2001 |title=Rebels, Rubyfruit, and Rhinestones: Queering Space in the Stonewall South |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wqt4krhmQrwC |publisher=Rutgers University Press |isbn=0-8135-2964-6 }}
{{cite book |last1=Shilts |first1=Randy |author-link=Randy Shilts |year=1987 |title=And the Band Played On: Politics, People, and the AIDS Epidemic |publisher=St. Martin's Press |isbn=0-312-00994-1 }}
{{cite book |last1=Smith |first1=Michael J. |year=1983 |title=Colorful People and Places: A Resource Guide for Third World Lesbians and Gay Men, and for White People who Share their Interests |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=JEGGAAAAIAAJ |publisher=Quarterly Press of BWMT }}
{{cite book |last1=Smith |first1=Raymond A. |author2=Donald P. Haider-Markel |year=2003 |title=Gay and Lesbian Americans and Political Participation: A Reference Handbook |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=m_boGY8AUTIC |publisher=ABC-CLIO |isbn=1-57607-256-8 }}
{{cite book |last1=Witt |first1=Lynn |author2=Sherilyn Thomas |author3=Eric Marcus |author3-link=Eric Marcus |year=1995 |title=Out in All Directions: The Almanac of Gay and Lesbian America |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1dw5AQAAQBAJ |location=New York |publisher=Warner Books |isbn=0-446-67237-8 }}

Category:1945 births

Category:1987 deaths

Category:AIDS-related deaths in Washington, D.C.

Category:African-American people in Washington, D.C., politics

Category:African-American candidates for Vice President of the United States

Category:American sociologists

Category:Dartmouth College alumni

Category:Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences alumni

Category:African-American LGBTQ people

Category:American gay politicians

Category:American LGBTQ rights activists

Category:University of Maryland, College Park faculty