Opponent of 'Don't Ask Don't Tell' at Lambda

As a federal appeals court judge, Abner Mikva struck down the military’s infamous ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ policy; soon he will be the keynote speaker for the Bon Foster Memorial Civil Rights Address sponsored by Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund. Mikva will address Lambda Friday, Oct. 12 at the Inter-Continental Chicago.

Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley is the event’s honorary co-chair.

As chief judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, Judge Mikva wrote the court’s decision rejecting the military’s anti-gay policy. His 1993 ruling in the case of Joseph Steffan (Steffan v. Aspin) was overturned after a rehearing before the full court.

The Bon Foster Address places the lesbian and gay civil-rights movement within the broader spectrum of civil-rights struggles. Named in honor of Bon Foster, a Chicago attorney who died of AIDS in 1991, and whose generosity aided creation of Lambda’s Midwest Regional Office, the event draws representatives from the area’s major law firms, corporations, organizations, and other supporters of the lesbian, gay, bi and trans community and those living with HIV/AIDS.