Group Aiding Deviates Issues Charity License, Evening Star (Article, September 1962)
Full Text
Group Aiding Deviates Issue Charity License
The Mattachine Society of Washington, an organization formed to protect homosexuals from discrimination, has been granted a certificate by the District license office to solicit funds in Washington.
The application said that the organization wanted to raise funds to help give the homosexual equal status with his fellow men.
District records show the newly organized society was granted its certificate to ask for contributions under the Charitable Solicitations Act on August 14.
C. T. Nottingham, superintendent of licenses and permits, said his office had no authority to deny a solicitation permit to any organization whose representatives answer all questions on the permit application form.
The license chief added that he had informed society representatives that if the group solicits "as much as one dollar," he would order them to open their books and records for examination. If such an order is not complied with, he said, the licensing department will move, to have the society permit revoked.
The president of the society, who asked that his name not be used, said that his organization "is dedicated to improving the status of homosexuals in our society in the interest both of that minority group and of the Nation."
Asked how many members the society had in the Washington area, he replied "we would prefer not to say. It is small but growing rapidly."
He said that the original Mattachine Society was founded in San Francisco 10 or 12 years ago. Other independent Mattachine Societies, he said, have been organized in New York and several other American cities.
The organizations took their names, he said, from the Mattachines, court jesters in the Middle Ages who were permitted to make pointed social commentaries which would have been tolerated from no one else.