Gay pride parade celebrates new marriage rights
By KAREN MATTHEWS.
By AP from Newsday.com on the Web, June 27, 2004
NEW YORK CITY -- Gay pride parade-goers danced down Fifth Avenue and waved rainbow flags Sunday in celebration of a movement that has made huge strides this year with the legalization of same-sex marriage in Massachusetts.
"Even 10 years ago I would have said that's the wrong issue," said Ed Glorius, arms entwined around his partner, Dwight Pollard, whom he married in an unofficial ceremony at a Manhattan restaurant last week.
"And now I feel very differently."
While Massachusetts became the only U.S. state to legally recognize gay marriages following a ruling by its Supreme Judicial Court last November, gay pride revelers said they expect New York and other states to follow.
"We will do it no matter what," said Ricardo Moran of Bridgehampton, on Long Island.
"It will be happening."
Officially called the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Pride March, the parade commemorates the Stonewall uprising of 1969, when gay bar patrons resisted a police raid.
The police did not give a crowd estimate, but organizers claimed nearly 300,000 participants.
There were marching bands, politicians including Mayor Michael Bloomberg and, as always, plenty of men wearing G-strings and towering heels.
Actor Harvey Fierstein, who recently completed a Broadway run in "Hairspray," drew cheers and cries of "We love you Harvey!"
But the stars of the parade were couples like Gus Archilla and Elmer Lokkins, who married in Canada last year after living together for 58 years.
They waved from a convertible with a "Just Married" sign on the bumper.
With President Bush supporting a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage, the parade was a political rally as much as a celebration.
Several contingents handed out voter registration forms, and Massachusetts Rep. Barney Frank led a large group of supporters of Sen. John Kerry, the presumed Democratic presidential nominee.
Frank, the first openly gay member of Congress, said he wasn't surprised that his state had legalized same-sex unions.
"I thought some day, but it happened earlier than I thought and it's been received better," he said.
Jim Williams of Baltimore said he was glad to see politicians marching.
"It shows how important the gay vote is," he said. "In a close election we can really make a difference."
For the fourth year running, the parade was preceded by a mass symbolic wedding in Central Park.
J.M. Sorrell, a justice of the peace in Massachusetts, told the 60 couples gathered to exchange vows how she cried when she officiated at the first legal same-sex wedding in Northampton, Mass.
"Everything has changed," she said. "It goes beyond the institution of marriage."
Evan Wolfson, executive director of the national advocacy group Freedom to Marry, said, "Let us celebrate today and then go to work.
New York should lead, not lag."
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