Op-Ed: California’s flawed LGBT rights bill

In the coming weeks, California’s Legislature will consider a bill sponsored by Democratic Assemblyman Evan Low that would ban most government-funded travel to states that discriminate, or allow private actors to discriminate, on the basis of sexual orientation, gender identity or gender expression. The law would affect all agencies, departments, boards, authorities, commissions and colleges. Elected officials and their staffs would be exempt, as would travel needed to enforce state law, meet old contractual obligations or protect public welfare or safety.

“California must take action,” the bill declares, “to avoid supporting or financing discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people.”

Although such discrimination is abhorrent, even LGBT rights activists should urge their representatives to vote against this flawed bill.

The bill’s upside is almost entirely symbolic. If it passes, Californians may feel morally superior; they’ll have fresh evidence of what has long been true: A majority of the California Legislature supports equality. And the bill may have some marginal negative effect on offending states’ economies.

But consider the unintended consequences — including the marginal negative effect on this state’s economy.

California employees will need to spend time and resources generating a list of verboten states, and then monitoring relevant legal changes on an ongoing basis. Every time an agency official submits a travel or travel reimbursement request to a location on the list, a California employee will need to determine whether an exception is warranted.

In a state with crumbling infrastructure, failing schools and homeless people sleeping under freeways, is that a defensible use of resources? Do we really need more red tape, more layers of bureaucracy?

Now think of the sorts of travel this law could prevent.

If a UCLA marine biologist wants to travel to Louisiana to complete research on the effect rising sea levels have on coastal communities, to visit a sustainable fish farm or to deliver a lecture on lessons California conservation efforts have for the Gulf Coast, should her ability to advance scholarship hinge on that state’s housing discrimination laws?

If a public defender wants to learn how to protect innocent clients from faulty forensic evidence, should he be denied permission to attend a professional development conference in Bloomington because the Indiana legislature passed an aggressive Religious Freedom Restoration Act?

If Texas runs afoul of the anti-discrimination bill, should state employees be forbidden from flying through the Dallas-Fort Worth airport on business, or denied reimbursement for food purchased during a four-hour layover?

Another problem with the bill is the damaging precedent it sets.

Say that the people of California and the people of Mississippi hold different views about the best way to handle a high school student who transitions from male to female and wants to use the girls’ locker room. We could implement our respective policies and agree to disagree. Alternatively, California could boycott Mississippi — harming that state’s transgender population right along with the rest of its residents — and risk a retaliatory boycott.

Nor is there any reason to believe that states would limit their tit-for-tat boycotts to LGBT rights.

“Our zero-tolerance policy says there is no room for discrimination of any kind in California,” Low argues, “and will certainly not be tolerated beyond our borders.” By that logic, California is complicit in every public policy in every state with which we do business. And every other state is complicit in our public policies.

Perhaps New York, New Jersey and Massachusetts will boycott California for having the death penalty on the books; Alabama and Oklahoma will add us to an offending states list because we allow late-term abortion; and Utah will tell its employees not to travel here because of our relatively lax alcohol laws. If the 50 states start refusing to do commerce with one another over moral disagreements, rather than taking a live-and-let-govern approach, we’ll all end up worse off.

Low doubtless believes in the rightness of his cause; and just as undoubtedly his intentions are pure. But a bill that elevates moral posturing at the expense of good outcomes should never become law.

Conor Friedersdorf is a contributing writer to Opinion, a staff writer at the Atlantic and founding editor of the Best of Journalism, a newsletter that curates exceptional nonfiction.

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