Presidential Address: Political Pawns in an Educational Endgame: Reflections on Bryant, Briggs, and Some Twentieth-Century School Questions

Abstract

The whole question of whether or not homosexual teachers should be allowed in the classroom is academic. Wearein the classroom, in virtually every school in the country, teaching effectively at every level in both public and private schools.—Michael Greene, 1977Newsweekran an article on “The Homosexual Teacher” in December 1978. At the end of a tumultuous two-year period framed by Anita Bryant's anti-gay campaign in South Florida and John Briggs' proposition to bar gay and lesbian educators from working in California public schools, reporters concluded, “Most homosexual teachers are deeply plagued by job anxiety.” That observation likely came as no surprise.