GLBTPress, June 3, 2004 News release + comments by Theissen

First gay married couple web site and fan club launched

From news release.
May 28, 2004

Tim Campbell, CEO, announces the formation of a fan club for Jack Baker and Mike McConnell, the first gay couple to marry way back in the early 1970s. <>

Why now? Because J. Michael McConnell filed a lawsuit in federal court just this past May 18, 2004 suing the Bush administration and the Internal Revenue Service because they won’t allow him to file a joint income-tax return.

The IRS wrote McConnell that <> McConnell filed his complaint on the thirty-fourth anniversary of the beginning of the fight for legal gay marriage in the United States.

The fan club is actively recruiting more fans. To join please send an e-mail which says <> to firstgaycouplefanclub@yahoo.com

Baker and McConnell also now have their very own web site. The purpose of the web site is to answer all the frequently asked questions about their early history. Many readers of today’s press, particularly of the gay press, were not even born back then.

The first gay couple’s web site address is www.May-18-1970.org. It is maintained by Ken Bronson out of Chicago. Baker and McConnell have called the site <> As the reader may have noticed, May 18, 1970 is the date Baker and McConnell first applied for a marriage license in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Unfortunately, a lowly clerk refused to issue them a marriage license. The Minnesota Supreme Court later upheld that clerk and the U.S. Supreme Court refused to review the issue. It’s opinion was curt: the couple’s early lawsuit lacked a “substantial federal question,” said the Warren Burger bunch.

The time is right now for a new go at the Supreme Court because younger people, so called <> are sitting on federal courts now. Moreover, a younger Supreme Court itself has already bit the bullet on sodomy laws. It’s not ok to discriminate with laws vis a vis “Lewinskis, ” to use a euphemism.

The U.S. Congress itself has also helped to <> this question. The passed the infamous federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) back in 1996.

Finally, the Bush administration itself forced this lawsuit when it told the IRS clerk to discriminate against McConnell and to write to him that <> They even made the word <> plural.

Naturally, everyone today can see that gay marriage is a very substantial federal question.
Fortunately, McConnell and Baker applied a second time for a marriage license, down in Mankato, in southern Minnesota. The license was granted and Baker and McConnell got married using it on Setptember 3, `971

To do that, Jack Baker changed his name legally to <> He is still publicly known as <> That’s the name he went by when the students at the University of Minnesota elected and reelected him student body president. Baker took the legal last name McConnell because the couple were thinking about adopting children. No courts have examined the McConnells’ Mankato marriage license. It is the one the one the Bush administration is refusing to honor now.

Back when Baker and McConnell first tried to get married, they generated a frenzy of news coverage. This led the University of Minnesota to deny McConnell a job he had in fact already been offered. In addition, the Minnesota Bar Association refused to grant Baker a license to practice law. Baker triumphed over the Bar Association and got his license in spite of them. McConnell, however, was less fortunate. He couldn’t beat the mamouth University of Minnesota. To this day it is exempt from anti-discrimination laws.


For more information about the early years go to the new website: www.may-18-1970.org.

Please do not contact the fan club or Baker and McConnell with predictable frequently asked questions (faqs) about the early years. Everybody is already exhausted from answering and reanswering those faqs. Thanks.

The FirstCoupleXyXy Fan Club is neither endorsed nor opposed by Baker and McConnell. They do not control it and they do not contribute to it financially.

BRAD THEISSEN'S COMMENTS*
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Brad Theissen's remarks absolutely succulent!
Dear Brad Theissen:
In the June 3 issue of GLBT Press, I found the long commentary about me which you attached anonymously a news release about Jack Baker and Mike McConnell succulent. Absolutely succulent!

I plead guilty as far as the North American Man/Boy Love Association goes. I believe NAMBLA is entitled to free speech like every other controversial and articulate entity.

I plead guilty to smacking on Barbara Carlson's front door with a orange traffic cone. Remember, she was intriguing to close down the bathhouses.

I plead not guilty to publishing an ugly likeness of any editor of Equal Time. I thought the image was flattering.

I was, however, perplexed by charges that I claim AIDS was spread by pork not sex. I do remember publishing articles by other controversial writers related to this theme. Just recently, there has been a lot in the news about new diseases coming from birds and poultry. I'd publish those articles too if there were a handful of scientists claiming AIDS was coming from birds and poultry. I truly believed the readership of the GLC Voice could handle it. I apologize if I caused you to get aids by abstaining from pork but eating your heart out at the baths. Get someone to explain that too you.

But I never doubted sex spread AIDS. I remember remarking at Bruce Brockway's memorial service that the only evidence that AIDS was a gay virus was that it went straight for the best looking men in the room. Remember Bruce, the sweetheart who helped me start the GLC Voice. Remember his publication "Positively Gay"? Odd that he picked that name. Remember when the saying was in?

Perhaps someone with the initials "BT" is suffering from some angst of his own...about sex.

But thanks for running the news release. Actions speak louder than words.

Kisses,

Tim Campbell
Houston, TX
Email: timcampbellxyx@yahoo.com
blog: www.timcampbellxyx.blogspot.com
Web site: www.may-18-1970.org
Fan email: firstgaycouplefanclub@yahoo.com