Many will never forgive his apparent lack of concern as so many perished from AIDS (though Deroy Murdock makes the case that much was actually being done), or that his administration helped legitimize the religious right as a political force. Still, his refusal to play the appeasement game brought down the Soviet Union and freed millions from totalitarianism, and his policies slowed the expansion of welfare-state paternalism and reversed economic stagnation here at home. A mixed legacy, as is so often the case.
Worth noting: the first openly gay couple spent a night together in the White House during Reagan's term. From a Washington Post story on March 18, 1984:
The Reagans are also tolerant about homosexual men. Their interior decorator, Ted Graber, who oversaw the redecoration of the White House, spent a night in the Reagans' private White House quarters with his male lover, Archie Case, when they came to Washington for Nancy Reagan's 60th birthday party -- a fact confirmed for the press by Mrs. Reagan's press secretary. Indeed, all the available evidence suggests that Ronald Reagan is a closet tolerant.
Deroy
Murdock's column helps puts to rest the charge that Reagan
harbored anti-gay animosity. He notes a Time magazine
story in which Patti Reagan recalls "the clear, smooth,
non-judgmental way" her father discussed homosexuality. Speaking of
Rock Hudson, she says:
My father gently explained that Mr. Hudson didn't really have a lot of experience kissing women; in fact, he would much prefer to be kissing a man. This was said in the same tone that would be used if he had been telling me about people with different colored eyes, and I accepted without question that this whole kissing thing wasn't reserved just for men and women.
Deroy also reminds us that Reagan publicly opposed Proposition 6, a 1978 ballot measure that called for the dismissal of California teachers who "advocated" homosexuality, even outside of schools. His opposition was considered instrumental to the measure's defeat.
And Deroy quotes Kenneth T. Walsh, former White House
correspondent and author of the biography Ronald Reagan,
who wrote: "Despite the urging of some of his conservative
supporters, he never made fighting homosexuality a cause. In the
final analysis, Reagan felt that what people do in private is their
own business, not the government's."