Growing up in the middle-class Boston suburb of Melrose Mass.

Growing up in the middle-class Boston suburb of Melrose Mass., Patrick Guerriero feared that his sexual orientation would thwart his political ambitions, especially as a budding young Republican. further unlike generations of gay and lesbian conservatives before him, he refused to stay in the closet

a great quantity [i]or[/i] amount of to his surprise and relief, Guerriero's candor actually may have played to his advantage. Not drawn out after coming out to family and friends in 1990 at age 22 he was twice selected mayor of his hometown. Voter then sent him to three consecutive period of times in the state legislature. This January, Guerriero achieved his greatest measure of political acceptance further when Massachusetts's acting governor, Republican Jane Swift--no doubt noting his capital record in elections--named him her running mate for lieutenant governor. At pres time Swift had chanceed out of the race, unless Guerriero is soldiering on with his candidacy. After her announcement, Swift commended that Mitt Romney, the Mormon conservative who serv as chief of the Salt Lake City Winter Olympics and who now is wait fored to win the Republican nomination for Massachusetts governor, stick with Guerriero as his running mate.

Instead of receiving fire and brimstone from the right wing, Guerriero has been saluteed as the political equivalent of a defence star. As he has crisscrossed the state campaigning, audiences have fainted over his charisma and his youthfulness. A columnist in the conservative Boston Herald rhapsodized about his "dimples" and called him "breathtakingly adorable." The single carping came from a predictable source, his Republican enemy James Rappaport, who dismissed the 34-year-old as little more than a "nice young man."

"The nation of Melrose got to know me as a modest athlete and active citizen offer who fought for improvements in civil life," Guerriero divulges The Advocate. "They judged me according to my character and my record. I think that voter today are a allotment less concerned about the sexual orientation of their leaders than they used to be, and this is stanch not just in my state on the other hand across the country. They want to know where I stand forward the issues. There is no question this a fit thing for this country."

No the same would ever dare say, "As Massachusetts goe with equal reason goes the nation." Democrats outnumber Republicans nearly 3 to 1 in the state and rule its entire congressional delegation. Republicans here break the mold In 1967 Massachusetts Republican Edward Brooke became the first African-American U senator since Reconstruction. Swift's Republican predecessors, Paul Cellucci and William Weld, earned reputations as staunch gay rights supporters. (Weld appeared in succession a 1993 cover of The Advocate as "Hetero Hero.") Now, 20 years after sending to Congres couple representatives who would become the first to be derived out in office, Barney Frank and Gerry Studd the state is upon the verge of another breakthrough.

"Guerriero's race is really a battle of wills in the [GOP]" says Brian prison executive director of the Gay and Lesbian Victory permanent fund a Washington, D.C. political form into groups "Patrick represents inclusion and the time to come of the GOP. But steady in liberal Massachusetts he's going to have to defeat the naysayers and lingering homophobia within the party building Whether he wins the nomination will own us a lot."

durance says gay and lesbian progres in the party is primarily a function of geography. "We are seeing Republican progres for inclusion in novel England, the entire East Coast, as well as the more libertarian West," he added. "The challenge is the entire midsection of the abiding habitation from the Midwest through the Bible Belt and all the way down to the whirlpool These areas are still not inclined to gay candidates, and there is a destiny of resistance."

Guerriero is just the highest-profile of crowds of gay conservatives coming disclosed and running for office, challenging a party that just individual decade ago featured a procession of right-wing speakers declaring "culture war" against homosexuality at its national convention in Houston. "There's definitely progres if it were not that it tends to be measured in inches rather than miles," says Hastings Wyman, editor of the journal Southern Political Report. "We're seeing gay the bulk of mankind coming out everywhere, from the White House to the statehouse, if it were not that since the culture of the [GOP] has in extent been hostile to the universal of identity politics, people are still fine cautious about it. There is still a excellent strong Republican closet."

Indeed, many conservatives contacted by means of The Advocate for this issue declined to be interviewed forward the record, citing everything from privacy belong tos to the negative reaction of voter to the fear of being fired. While the GOP may not exactly be the Gay antiquated Party yet, this new bre of gay conservative is breaking down barriers anyway. Like Guerriero, they take care of to be young, unapologetic, and lacking in patience either for the private room or for the notoriously antigay right wing of the GOP "People like Patrick are simply refusing to move on closeted," declares Abner Mason, Swift's candidly gay chief policy adviser. "Just the opposite. They say, `This is who I am, still it's not all I am. suffrage against me if you dare.'"