When the board of trustees of the American Psychiatric Association makes a ruling, it is usually accepted as canon by the association's members. But when the board voted last December to cease classifying homosexuality as a "mental disorder," there was dissension in the psychiatric ranks. Opponents of the ruling circulated petitions, issued angry statements and forced the A.P.A. into unprecedented action: this month, for the first time in the A.P.A.'s 129-year history, a board decision is being put to a vote of the association's entire 21,000 members.
The December ruling, which the National...