Late Legislator’s Courage, Humor Recalled Friends Say Fond Farewell To Sen. Cal Anderson

Friends and colleagues of Sen. Cal Anderson bid farewell Thursday to the state’s first openly gay lawmaker, hailing the bravery of his personal battle against AIDS and his perennial fight to pass gay-rights legislation.

Tears mingled with laughter, applause and storytelling in a two-hour funeral that combined the age-old ritual of the Catholic Mass with the trappings of a political rally.

About 2,000 people, including Gov. Mike Lowry, legislators, and gay and lesbian leaders, jammed St. James Cathedral, the state’s largest Catholic church. The crowd spilled into the street when there was no more standing room.

Anderson, 47, died last Friday of AIDS-related illness. He was the first major politician in Washington to identify himself as homosexual and tried unsuccessfully for more than a decade to push through legislation to bring gays and lesbians under the anti-discrimination laws of the state.

He had served in the Legislature since 1987 after holding top offices in the state Democratic Party. He was elected to the Senate from Seattle’s heavily Democratic 43rd District by more than 80 percent of the vote last fall.

His body lay in state in the church lobby before the service, a red AIDS ribbon pinned to his lapel. His casket was later closed and draped with an American flag for the decorated Vietnam veteran. An honor guard and pallbearers escorted the coffin into the sanctuary as the crowd sang “For All the Saints,” with its reference to the “well-fought fight.”

The Rev. Michael Ryan likened Anderson to John F. Kennedy as a man of “great stature and great substance” who “believed that all people counted, the little as much as the great, the marginalized as well as the mainstream.”

The audience laughed knowingly when Senate Majority Leader Marcus Gaspard recalled some of the senator’s attempts to use humor to disarm or comfort others. Once near the end of his life, Anderson apologized for being late to his own birthday party by rubbing his pate, bald due to his chemotherapy, and saying “I just couldn’t do a THING with my hair,” Gaspard recalled.

“Through grace and courage, he got people to see past stereotypes,” he said.

Former state Democratic Chairwoman Karen Marchioro, Anderson’s mentor when he was state party secretary for 12 years, also recalled his wicked sense of humor.

Four members of the Makah tribe of Neah Bay chanted a haunting hymn, punctuating the words with the chime of a lone bell.