The Lost Battle of 2010:

• Post by: Kenneth D. Whitehead
• March 23, 2011

How President Obama Executed a Campaign Pledge and What It Means for America When a lame-duck Congress voted last December to overturn a 1993 law, one passed by huge majorities of both houses of Congress and which unambiguously proscribed homosexual conduct as incompatible with military service, the repeal engendered a widespread reaction that the whole business was really no big deal. The response was both anti-climatic and not surprising, considering the acrimonious controversy that led up to the December vote. Once President Barack Obama signed the repeal into law, public indifference proved to be massive and the media abruptly dropped the subject. The ho-hum reaction was especially troubling, given the consequences of repeal not only for the military, but also for the state of matrimony, a foundational social institution in America. Since the beginning of the Republic, Americans have so consistently renounced homosexual activity that the status of homosexuals in the military was never an issue. Until the rise of the homosexual-rights movement, it was not remotely suggested or imagined that homosexuals, or “gays” as they have come to call themselves, constitute a class of people whose needs require special recognition and protection. Indeed, when it passed the original 1993 legislation, Congress was simply codifying long-standing military policy prohibiting homosexual conduct in the armed forces. In implementing the law, however, the Clinton administration adopted regulations—regulations which became known as the “don’t ask, don’t tell” (DADT) policy—that allowed homosexuals to serve discreetly in the military. The regulations subverted both federal law and military practice by not asking recruits about their homosexuality, so that if they did not “tell,” homosexuals would not be refused admission to the armed services or be discharged. Nonetheless, homosexual acts remained a legally disqualifying condition of military service, even a