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Grex > Agora46 > #47: Supreme Court strikes down antisodomy laws in "Lawrence v. Texas | |
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| 25 new of 191 responses total. |
slynne
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response 25 of 191:
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Jun 30 01:03 UTC 2003 |
I think Nevada has had success with regulated prostitution.
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twenex
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response 26 of 191:
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Jun 30 03:41 UTC 2003 |
Re the SCOTUS decision, about time, imho as an interested observer (no, that
doesn't mean i'm gay).
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lk
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response 27 of 191:
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Jun 30 04:23 UTC 2003 |
...Not that there's anything wrong with it....
I've heard that Scalia is one of the brightest minds on the bench.
(A powerful witch, but a bad witch.) Does he really not realize
that this has no more to do with the "homosexual agenda" than his
objections are part of the "'moral majority' agenda"?
Actually, here's what he said:
http://news.findlaw.com/hdocs/docs/scotus/lwrnctx62603opn.pdf
[The Court] has largely signed on to the SO-CALLED homosexual
agenda by which I mean the agenda promoted by some homosexual
activists directed at eliminating the moral opprobrium that has
traditionally attached to homosexual conduct.
Well, by that standard, a majority of Americans support this "agenda".
But in the next paragraph, Scalia makes reference to the "culture war":
It is clear from this that the Court has taken sides in the
culture war, departing from its role of assuring, as neutral
observer, that the democratic rules of engagement are observed.
Many Americans do not want persons who openly engage in homosexual
conduct as partners in their business, as scoutmasters for their
children, as teachers in their children's schools, or as boarders
in their home. They view this as protecting themselves and their
families from a lifestyle that they believe to be immoral and
destructive.
I see. That many of these same people similaraly "viewed" miscegnation laws
seems to be lost on Scalia. Not to mention that they are just "protecting
themselves" from falling property values should a mixed couple (let alone a
full-blown black couple) move into the neighborhood, even if as boarders....
The truth of the matter is that it was the Court, in the 1986 Bowers v.
Hardwick case, which took the wrong side in the culture war. It lost,
precisely because that was a bad decision based on an "agenda" rather
than one made as "neutral observer". (That was a 5-4 decision, and Justice
Lewis Powell later stated that it was his one vote he wished he could change.)
It's almost surprising that the most egregious of sodomy laws (which
prohibit sexual behavior unequally, prohibiting it only to homosexuals)
managed to stay on the books for so long following the ruling that
Colorado's Amendment 2 was unconstitutional.
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jaklumen
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response 28 of 191:
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Jun 30 05:04 UTC 2003 |
Most of these sodomy laws were never really strictly enforced
anyways. Probably better that they should go.
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rcurl
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response 29 of 191:
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Jun 30 05:51 UTC 2003 |
Not just "probably" - absolutely.
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pvn
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response 30 of 191:
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Jun 30 06:32 UTC 2003 |
So vote them out? So vote for legislators that repeal them. This is
the way it is supposed to work. The Texas legislature voted the law in
the first place, it ought to be up to them to repeal it.
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jmsaul
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response 31 of 191:
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Jun 30 13:10 UTC 2003 |
That doesn't work. Legislators don't want to spend time getting rid of old
laws, because they want to focus on passing new ones to protect their special
interests. They almost never go back and get rid of old ones that aren't
being enforced much anyway.
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other
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response 32 of 191:
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Jun 30 13:28 UTC 2003 |
Besides, it IS THE JOB of the SCOTUS, under the balance of powers
principle, to invalidate legislation which violates the constitutional
priciples on which this country is founded, however the SCOTUS interprets
them.
Since citizens of the various states are citizens of the union, state
laws are subject to invalidation for the protection of the rights of all
citizens.
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polygon
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response 33 of 191:
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Jun 30 15:43 UTC 2003 |
This is not some musty old hardly-noticed law we're talking about. Texas
enacted it in the late 1970s, and I think it went into effect 1/1/1980.
Moreover, the case came to the Supreme Court because TWO GUYS WERE
PROSECUTED under it.
The same law also makes dildos illegal in Texas.
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tod
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response 34 of 191:
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Jun 30 18:27 UTC 2003 |
This response has been erased.
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gull
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response 35 of 191:
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Jun 30 19:59 UTC 2003 |
Re #27: Everyone who reads Scalia's frothing dissent should remember
that this is the guy Bush has pointed to as an example of the type of
justice he wants to appoint. Read the whole thing, too -- he spends a
good chunk of it arguing that Roe v. Wade should be overturned.
Re #30: I believe a Michigan state rep has proposed legislation to
repeal Michigan's anti-sodomy law. His reasoning was that the law is
now invalid, and repealing it will prevent the state from having to
spend money in a doomed attempt to defend it later if someone decides to
try to prosecute under it.
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mdw
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response 36 of 191:
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Jun 30 21:27 UTC 2003 |
Wow, unusual sense from a Michigan state rep. Probably doomed though;
I'm sure the republican majority will argue to keep it anyways for
"symbolic" value.
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gull
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response 37 of 191:
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Jun 30 23:12 UTC 2003 |
Could be. I don't remember right now who introduced the legislation,
but it was a Democrat.
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janc
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response 38 of 191:
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Jul 1 00:36 UTC 2003 |
Hmmm...would this mean that it will become legal for Valerie and me to live
together without being married?
Last week I was called for jury duty. I just missed being selected. If I
had been selected, I would have been asked if I was married. I was trying
to figure that out. "No" would have been a factually correct answer, but my
life is pretty much indistinguishable from a married person. "No but I'm
living with a person as if we were married" would have been precisely
accurate, but it would have been admitting to a crime in to a judge in court.
That would have been the option I'd have taken, and I presume nothing would
have come of it. Still, I wouldn't mind if that law up and left. Of course,
if it didn't exist, we'd probably be married under common law.
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scg
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response 39 of 191:
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Jul 1 01:00 UTC 2003 |
A sure way to get removed from jury duty on grounds of being an unpredictable
weirdo would probably be to respond to "are you married?" with "on the advice
of my attorney, I decline to answer."
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richard
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response 40 of 191:
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Jul 1 02:21 UTC 2003 |
re: back a few responses....actually the cover of Newsweek this week
specifically poses the suggestion that Lawrence v Texas could lead to the
legalization of gay marriages in the u.s. Being that the sodomy laws that
lawrence v texas has invalidated were a main argument against legalizing
gay marriage, that one thing sanctioned the other and if the other was
illegal than marriage should be illegal. This won't be the case anymore.
Canada has already legalized gay marriages. I see no reason why it must
continue to be an issue in the U.S. now
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jmsaul
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response 41 of 191:
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Jul 1 02:45 UTC 2003 |
Re #38: Possibly. Michigan's never had common-law marriage as far as I
know, so even if they changed the obsolete cohabitation law, it's
not clear that we'd have common-law marriage.
Re #40: If that were the only argument, you'd be right.
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bru
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response 42 of 191:
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Jul 1 02:53 UTC 2003 |
Another arguement is that this may end up making incest legal. Keep in mind
that it was legal in michigan until just recently (1980s?) when some guy and
his daughter were caught in a relationship that bore az number of children,
and they could not be prosecuted under state law.
Keep in mind I am talking about between consenting adults, not forcing a
minor.
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slynne
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response 43 of 191:
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Jul 1 03:08 UTC 2003 |
so what?
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mdw
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response 44 of 191:
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Jul 1 03:32 UTC 2003 |
I don't see much point of simularity. Last I heard, gay men were not
known for becoming pregnant, accidently or otherwise.
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jmsaul
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response 45 of 191:
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Jul 1 04:03 UTC 2003 |
Re #42: That's the first one you've come up with that could actually be an
issue. There is a legal justification for barring incest that can
produce kids, but it becomes more interesting if fertility is out
of the picture.
However, was it really worth making millions of gays and lesbians
into felons to stop a relatively small number of consensual adult
incest cases? Or is it better to deal with incest as a separate
issue?
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lk
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response 46 of 191:
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Jul 1 04:08 UTC 2003 |
Whew. That's a relief. I thought we were doing something wrong.
I believe it was Chris Kolb who introduced (? or spoke of?) legislation
to repeal Michigan's sodomy laws.
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polygon
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response 47 of 191:
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Jul 1 04:21 UTC 2003 |
Aa I recall it, when Michigan's rape law was revised in the 1970s, they
didn't see the point of outlawing adult incest as such.
Then, a few years ago, that poster couple in Hillsdale came along. Not
only were they father and daughter in an incestuous relationship, not only
did they produce numerous offspring, but they seriously neglected or
abused the children. It was this last issue which brough them to the
attention of the authorities and media.
It was at that point that Michigan's status as the only state where adult
incest was legal became a serious embarrassment, and the law was changed.
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other
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response 48 of 191:
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Jul 1 05:59 UTC 2003 |
Which leads nicely into the real reason that Michigan's sodomy law is
unlikely to be repealed under a Republican majority. None of them want
to be identified as having supported the repeal of a law against
homosexuality.... regardless of the actual or imagined costs.
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scg
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response 49 of 191:
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Jul 1 07:04 UTC 2003 |
So various opponants of this ruling keep trotting out all sorts of other
things that could be made legal by it. Some of them are far fetched, having
very little to do with privacy. For those that really fall under the same
justifications of this ruling (adult incest, I suppose, if it were really
non-coercive and didn't produce children, polygamy, etc.), why not? They're
not my sort of thing, but I find it hard to make the case that they hurt
anybody else.
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