How about when liberals/libertarians loudly appladed the federal government imposing its immorality on the states in the Lawrence vs. Texas sodomy case?
That's pretty paradoxical too, right?
That's pretty paradoxical too, right?
It can be in the context of government as arbiter of morality.
Paradoxically, that's going to get you labeled as a liberal/libertarian when it comes time to talk about using the federal government as a means of controlling individual vices.
Tgun Joe:
How about when liberals/libertarians loudly appladed the federal government imposing its immorality on the states in the Lawrence vs. Texas sodomy case? That's pretty paradoxical too, right?
Wrong, -- the fed-gov didn't impose 'immorality', [it has no 'moral' powers, nor do States].
The Constitution was used by the USSC to 'strike down' a State infringement of a fundamental property right, -- the right to close your bedroom door and act as you please with another consenting adult.
The paradox is in a constitutional conservative claiming a State has the power to prohibit misdemeanor sin & dictate morality.
IMHO, what should have happened (based on my understanding of the case) would have been for the USSC to dismiss without prejudice, with instructions for the defendants to present arguments (if they had any) that the action of the men was not in any way worse than the action of others whom law enforcement was aware of but ignored. My expectation would be that the defendants would have been able to provide at least some evidence to that effect, and that the state would have been able to provide at least some evidence to the contrary. If that indeed occurred, the case should then have been remanded to trial court to determine whose evidence was more credible.
I have read allegations that the two men in this case were trying to push a test case up to the Supreme Court, and placed the 'burglary' call themselves. If the state had been able to prove that, the men should have been convicted and I don't think there would have been much outcry. If the men had been able to prove that they were minding their own business and trying to be discrete, that the police were well aware of many sodomy cases they did not bother to pursue, and that they had no reason to expect to be intruded upon, then they should have been acquitted.
I don't know which way the facts of the case would have gone, but I think having the matters decided in trial court would have been much better than having the USSC make a blanket ruling.