The Newsweek cover image

This week’s edition of Newsweek, with is it’s poorly photoshopped cover declaring Barack Obama our first gay president, has caused quite a stir.
The reference is itself sensationalistic and dumb, playing on the
notion of Bill Clinton being our first black president. Too bad, too,
since the discussion about Newsweek’s cover distracts from the
interesting article by Andrew Sullivan inside the magazine.

Okay, so Newsweek didn’t mean for us to take it literally. But it didn’t take long for outlets like Daily Kos and Salon to point out that not only is Obama not gay, our first gay president was most likely James Buchanan. And his presumed lover? Our first gay vice president, Rufus King. And Obama is not (even nominally) our second gay president as that title most likely belongs to Abe Lincoln. As long as we’re on a gay civics lesson, which Federalist was queer? Alexander Hamilton,
our first bisexual cabinet member. To find out more about these queer
18th and 19th century politicians, follow the links below:

Read more about our first gay president and our first gay vice president, James Buchanan and Rufus King.

Read more about our second gay/queer president, Abraham Lincoln.

Read more about our first queer cabinet member, Alexander Hamilton.

There have always been queer people and their will always be queer
people. That some of our presidents or early statesmen enjoyed the
affections of other men should really come as no surprise.