SENATOR DIANNE FEINSTEIN, APPEARING IN WARREN SONBERT’S 1981 FILM NOBLESSE OBLIGE.

GME remembers Senator Dianne Feinstein, who passed away on September 29th at the age of 90. Feinstein was a key figure in LGBTQ+ history in the United States. Feinstein was president (and notably, the first woman president) of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors when City Supervisor Harvey Milk, the first openly gay man to be elected to public office in California, and Mayor George Moscone, were murdered by former City Hall supervisor Dan White on November 27th, 1978. Feinstein was the first person to find Milk’s body and to announce to reporters: “Both Mayor Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk have been shot and killed. The suspect is Supervisor Dan White.” Feinstein ultimately succeeded Moscone as mayor.

Feinstein was celebrated for her advocacy, in general, of the queer community and LGBTQ+ rights. Notably, she voted against the Defense of Marriage Act in 1996, which banned federal recognition of same sex marriage, and the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy that required LGBTQ+ military service members to remain closeted. She also supported the LBGTQ+ community at the height of the HIV/AIDS crisis, and “dedicated huge amounts of city resources and funding, more so than the federal government was doing at that time, to try to stem the spread of this disease that was killing gay men in the city,” according to Bay Area Reporter editor and political columnist Matthew S. Bajko.

Admittedly, Feinstein did not have a perfect track record in regards to LGBTQ+ rights; she criticized San Francisco mayor Gavin Newsom’s decision to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples in 2004, in violation of state law, as an action that was “too much, too fast, too soon.” However, Feinstein was praised for her ability to evolve politically, and become a consistent ally to the queer community. As noted by Kierra Johnson, executive director of the National LGBTQ+ Task Force:“No one could ever say she was, you know, the biggest champion of LGBTQ issues… [but] what I think is so powerful about who she is, is that we saw her evolve over time.”

Feinstein’s support of LGBTQ+ rights and causes throughout her career, and her close proximity to the work — and tragic deaths — of Moscone and Milk, are not the only examples of her presence in the broader LGBTQ+ historical consciousness. She was also captured on film by Warren Sonbert, an experimental filmmaker whose work included depictions of gay life on screen, as well as encoded in the subtext of a number of his films. His work is exclusively represented by Gartenberg Media Enterprises.

Feinstein appears briefly in Sonbert’s 1981 film NOBLESSE OBLIGE, described by GME President Jon Gartenberg as “a masterfully edited work that features imagery Sonbert photographed of protests in San Francisco following the murders of Moscone and Milk at the hands of White.” Feinstein’s appearance in Sonbert’s film can be viewed in the video at the top of this page.

(Sources: AP News, Light Cone, Gartenberg Media Enterprises).