In a little sleepy suburban town, in a town that is just one letter off from the Holy Land, in the village known as Palatine, a drama played out over the past few months that would quietly and insidiously, but surely and inevitably, lead to the demise of any hope or chance for affirmation of our humanity in the state of Illinois.

An unholy alliance was forged between a tiny evil cabal of fanatical rightwing zealots and a well-intentioned, good-hearted but hopelessly flawed individual that can now only spiral out of control, leading her down to the depths of hell where the fanatics abide.

State Representative Suzie Bassi sold her soul to the devil in exchange for her seat in the General Assembly. She is a good and caring person. A person who cried when I first approached her over a year ago now, to ask her to vote for the non-discrimination bill, the gay rights bill, the transgender rights bill. Even then she knew so strongly that it was the right thing to do, that she broke down in tears as we talked about the people in the northwest suburbs that the law had failed.

It was all so overwhelming. She so desperately wanted to do the right thing, to help the children of the district, to work for the education for all of the children within the state. And she knew that she could only do that if she could establish a firm foothold in the legislature, so that her seat would be there for the future.

And so, she would not commit to vote for our rights in her first term. She was afraid she would lose her seat. She was afraid of the radical right, the family values people, the ones who hide behind a thin veil of morality to work evil. But we did agree that she would not vote against the bill, that she would vote "present", and, AND, that if she did not have a primary run against her by the rightwing, she would consider voting for our rights.

Suzie actually surprised me the first time the bill came up for a vote. Disregarding her fears, disregarding the Republican guard hovering over her desk on the House floor, disregarding her personal ambition, Suzie pushed the "yes" button when our bill came up for a vote on that fateful day in March last year. It was the first day of spring, the day when hope should be springing eternal, as light and life returns to the world.

But that first day of spring last year quickly turned dark as the votes climbed, and climbed, and climbed to just within a single solitary vote of passing our human rights … and then sunk like a punctured balloon, dashed to earth as first one and then another votes pulled off the "yes" side of the board, to register that irrevocable and resounding "NO, YOUR RIGHTS DO NOT COUNT IN ILLINOIS!"

Suzie got cold feet that day, and she's been running scared ever since. She changed her "yes" vote. She was one of the two who pulled back at the last minute. I don't know whether she voted "no" or "present." It doesn't matter. The vote was still the same. We needed 60 to pass that spring day, we got 57. There would be no birds singing and crocus blooming in my yard. The groundhog was wrong. The winter, that long, hard winter, the gray, bleak days of our winter of discontent would not end on March 21, 1999.

The Eve of the Millenium came and went. Can you imagine my surprise and delight when I looked at the roster of people who had filed for primaries to find that Suzie Bassi had no opponents! There would be no primary in the almost-holy town of Palatine, because the evil cabal had somehow found in their stony hearts enough forgiveness to allow Suzie Bassi to run unopposed.

But not only that, a Democrat has NEVER won in my district. It is bastion of Republicanism. They could run Ronald Reagan today, Alzheimer's and all, and he would win in Palatine over the best of the Democrats. Suzie Bassi was in. She was golden. She could not lose. She was virtually guaranteed the win not only in March with no opposition, but also in November against any Democrat, even if they could find one.

Photo by Israel Wright, Copyright 2000, Lambda Publications, Chicago

So I asked her once more to vote for our rights. She replied, "Miranda, regretfully I can't give you my vote this year. I do not have an opponent in the primary, but … I know my district isn't where it needs to be yet. We'll keep working for education."

"Regretfully I cannot give you my vote this year"

Well, Suzie, words cannot express how disappointed I am in your callous decision to deny my rights for yet another year. Let's see whether I can explain this a little more clearly. Let's say the year is 1960, and my name is Rosa Parks, and I come up to you and say, "Suzie, I am tired of walking to the back of the bus every day. I am tired of worrying whether that fat greasy white owner of the lunch counter is going to kick me out because I am black. I am tired of fearing for my life when I walk down the streets of Palatine."

Would you say to her, "Regretfully I cannot give you my vote this year"? Because that is what you just said to me. And it hurts just as much.

What I did not know at that time, and what I am still trying to comprehend, is that Suzie Bassi really did sell out to retain her seat. I am not naïve in the ways of politics, and I know that deals are made all the time. Suzie made a deal with the Family Taxpayer Network, a rightwing homophobic lunatic fringe group, that they would not run an opponent against her. In exchange, she agreed not to vote for the non-discrimination bill.

House Bill 474 was not called in early March in time to be sent to the Senate for a spring vote. I don't know if it will be called. It may have died on the House floor. It was not called because we were short by one or two votes. Suzie Bassi's vote was one of those.

Miranda Stevens-Miller
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MirandaSt1@aol.com