EAGLESWOOD, NEW JERSEY - He used to be Mr. William McBeth. Now, after undergoing a sex change, 71-year-old Lily McBeth is ready to return to teaching kindergarten through sixth grade as Miss McBeth.
After hours of public debate and a private meeting with McBeth and his lawyer, the Eagleswood Elementary school board took no action on calls to bar McBeth from returning to the school where he taught for five years before "becoming a woman."
McBeth, a retired sales executive who was married for 33 years and has three children, had his penis removed last year and then re-applied for his job under a new name, "lily."
Steven Goldstein, chairman of Garden State Equality, a "gay rights advocacy group" supporting McBeth's bid to resume teaching, called the school board's action historic. The real sin, he said, would be to not allow McBeth to continue teaching in Eagleswood.
McBeth also had the support of the ACLU. The group threatened a lawsuit, warning that in July of 2001, the Appellate Division of the Superior Court determined that denying employment to a "transgender person" amounts to sexual discrimination.
"You can't discriminate against a man for not living up to the stereotype of what a man is supposed to be," Ed Barocas, legal director for the ACLU of New Jersey, said.
A third Jewish organization, the so-called "Human Rights Campaign" issued a statement from its president, Joe Solmonese, who said, "Anti-transgender discrimination has no place in our schools."
The Human Rights Campaign bills itself as the "largest lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender political organization" in the United States.