Alabama state Rep. Gerald Allen (R-Tuscaloosa) plans to propose a bill in the 2005 legislative session to ban books with gay themes or characters from public libraries. (Photo by Dave Martin/AP)
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Dec 17, 2004  |  By: DYANA BAGBY  | COMMENTS |   |  

Alabama state Rep. Gerald Allen (R-Tuscaloosa) wants to ban public funding for any books with gay characters or content to protect children from the “homosexual agenda.”

For those books already in the state’s public and university libraries, Allen suggests that people “dig a big hole and dump them in and bury them.”

Meanwhile, South Carolina state Rep. John Graham Altman (R-Charleston) is so disgusted that the state’s public television station recently aired a gay documentary, he plans to propose bills to slash the station’s funding and give state lawmakers control over the station’s governing body.

“It’s propaganda,” Altman said about the 26-minute documentary, titled “We Are Your Neighbors,” that aired as part of the station’s Southern Lens series featuring donated programming about the lives of Carolinians.

“When the state public TV station starts to promote a political agenda to help influence legislators, I say that is not the purpose of South Carolina Education TV (SCETV),” Altman said last week, adding that he has seen the documentary.

Allen and Altman’s bills, to be discussed in their states’ upcoming legislative sessions, set off alarms for some gay rights activists who said they fear a continuing backlash against recent victories, including legal same-sex marriage in Massachusetts.

Some pundits consider Allen’s proposed bill outlandish, but the state representative has the ear of President Bush and has met with him at least five times, according to a story in The Guardian, a London newspaper.

Allen’s most recent meeting with the president was Dec. 13 in Washington, D.C., where he and other state legislators met with members of Americans for Tax Reform, according to White House press spokesman Dan Nelson.

President Bush stopped by the meeting and made some informal comments, Nelson said. He said he did not know what was specifically discussed.

Allen also confirmed he’s met with the president several times and that Monday’s meeting was only to talk about tax reform and not about his proposed book ban. Allen also said he has “never” talked to the president about “moral values” issues.

“[P]lays glamorizing homosexuality, books advocating gay and lesbian activities, public financial support for activities organized by homosexuals have created an undue influence on the children in our schools,” Allen said in a statement. “Whether inborn or acquired, [homosexuality] is still, like all sexual contact apart from marriage, immoral.”

Gay rights activists in Alabama said they believe Allen, who also backs a state constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage, is simply trying to garner national attention by his proposed book ban.

“He’s shooting himself in the foot. He’s just lost it,” said Helene Loper, chair of Equality Alabama, a statewide gay rights group.

“He’s gotten himself a lot of national ridicule, but we’ll have to watch it though,” Loper said. “We have an active Christian Coalition, and if they get behind this, they can make it a sticky issue for politicians.”

Olivia Turner, executive director of the ACLU of Alabama, said Allen’s proposed bill is “bad public policy, unconstitutional and just plain wrong.”

“If this bill becomes law, it is also likely to entangle Alabama, once again, in costly litigation that will deprive the people of Alabama of money badly needed to improve education and human services,” she said in a statement.

In South Carolina, critics of Altman’s proposal to cut SCETV’s funding said it is a serious concern and may have a better chance of being approved than Allen’s bill seeking censorship of gay-themed literature in Alabama.

SCETV’s budget is currently at $12.7 million, down from $20.3 million in 2000-2001, said Catherine Christman, vice president of communications for the public television station.

“He’s the only representative we’ve heard from, but after his comments we’ve received an outpouring of support both from viewers and editorials in the newspapers,” she said.

Altman said he intends to find out how much it costs to run a half-hour program during primetime on commercial TV and then propose the legislature cut that specific amount from the station’s budget. He said he also wants the legislature to have more oversight of how the station is governed.

“I would fight and oppose ETV if they aired a 30-minute show that said the AIDS pestilence was God’s righteous judgment upon the sinning homosexual,” Altman said. “I don’t want someone saying black folk are inferior to white folk or the Holocaust is a Zionist ...