Ted Kennedy Remembered as LGBT Hero

When Sen. Ted Kennedy's death was reported, the leader of the Human Rights Campaign, Joe Solmonese, said we mourned the loss of the nation's "greatest champion and strongest voice for justice, fairness, and compassion."

"There was no greater hero for advocates of LGBT equality than Sen. Ted Kennedy," Solmonese reflected. "From the early days of the AIDS epidemic to our current struggle for marriage equality, he has been our protector, our leader, our friend. He has been the core of the unfinished quest for civil rights in this country, and there is now a very painful void."

Senator Kennedy hailed from a famously influential family. Two of his brothers, President John F. Kennedy and onetime attorney-general and presidential candidate Bobby Kennedy, were tragically assassinated, in 1963 in and 1968, respectively. Years earlier he lost his oldest brother, Joe, who was killed in action during World War II.

The senator from Massachusetts was a strong proponent of LGBT rights and opposed the ban on gays in the military. Initially elected to the Senate in 1962, during his tenure he fought to strengthen and expand hate-crimes laws to cover victims who were targeted specifically for their sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, or disability. In the 1980s, while conservatives dismissed AIDS as a "gay plague," Kennedy called for action and fought for the funding of AIDS research. He was a tireless warrior for liberal causes in his 40-plus years of public service.
A champion of women, minorities, and LGBT people, Senator Kennedy believed “the controversy about the Moral Majority arises not only from its views, but from its name -- which, in the minds of many, seems to imply that only one set of public policies is moral and only one majority can possibly be right.”
He supported Barack Obama's successful campaign for president in 2008 and told voters, "With Barack Obama, we will turn the page on the old politics of misrepresentation and distortion. With Barack Obama, we will close the book on the old politics of race against race, gender against gender, ethnic group against ethnic group, and straight against gay."
Tell us: What advocates and politicians (past and present) do you look up to? Which great quotes from great men and women inspire you?