Posted on 04/26/2003 12:28:27 PM PDT by The Old Hoosier
Sed contra, this is a winning issue that will help ring in a GOP sweep in 2004.
Who?
If precedent prevails, why did the SC take this case in the first place? It already had a ruling based on a non-existent privacy right, even though Georgia has a right to privacy in its Constitution.
Does the SC typically take a case just to reaffirm a precedent, or wouldn't the precedent be affirmed simply by refusing to take the case?
I've read here that they took this case specifically because the Texas statute excludes heterosexuals.
BTW, this has been a good discussion.
Premises, premises. Similar desire and behavior does not make you a "class."
Not necessarily, and in most cases no.
I understand the ninth amendment issue here. But in this case, no, there never was a right to sodomy recognized at any time in our legal tradition, and in fact laws against sodomy have always been around. Someone even listed some of them on a thread yesterday--"let them both be put to death" was the wording in Vermont, I think. Based on the commonlaw tradition, this is really a 10th amendment issue, because the courts have said that states have the right to regulate health and morals.
Regardless, this is the reason we have a representative democratic process--not so that we can have 9 judges decide what all the laws in the country are going to be.
Well, the GOP may sweep, but I doubt this will factor into the voting pattern of anybody who didn't already agree with Santorum.
I agree with you. As a conservative, I do not want government dictating what happens in anyone's home as long as it's not hurting anyone.
Darth Bader Ginsburg aka "Buzzie"
They took it becase at least four justices voted to take it, no other reason. Many members of the court (Ginsberg, Souder, Stevens, Breyer) have no regard for precedent, law or tradition whatsoever, but are really just activists who got on the court to advance their un-American agenda.
I've read here that they took this case specifically because the Texas statute excludes heterosexuals.
That is likely. But a 14th amendment decision like that, that adds sexual preference as a new protected class, would be a very unwise decision. Like I said before, that decision will lead to the striking of all anti-gay-marriage laws and amendments to state constitutions, as well as the federal Defense of Marriage Act. It is only a matter of time before some future liberal in a lower court uses that precedent to force states to grant marriage licenses to gays.
If the court rules that there is a right to private consensual sexual behavior, then yes, that is correct. Not only legal, but a constitutional right.
What is your opinion on the gov't confiscating my property (tax dollars) to pay for the social results of said "bedroom" activity? What about AIDS funding and research? What about condom distribution and sex-ed in schools? What about the family breakdown and all the needy or screwed-up kids that result from these free-willing bedroom activities? What about the STD's that inevitably result because the bedrooms keep rotating? Do you favor the gov't confiscating money from me to fund these issues and problems? Where's my freedom in all of this?
Is there lots of that stuff going on?
Somehow, I don't think people are just waiting for a cue from the SC to dump their spouses so they can sleep with their children.
It's not a question of whether it happens often. It's a question of whether states should even be able to outlaw it.
Or their children's dogs.
My thoughts on this case are that there isn't a right to privacy in the Constitution. People may want there to be one, but that's what the amendment process is about. And like state laws, amendments to the US Constitution are a legislative matter, not a judicial one.
If people want the Constitution to say something, draft and ratify an amendment. Get ready to define what "privacy" means and to explain how actions that happen in one's house do or do not effect others in the society you are a citizen of. I think you'll find the scope of "privacy" shrinking and shrinking if you think about the consequences all actions have, wether they occur on this side of a wall or that one. But don't twist the 9th and 14th amendments into signifying something no-one imagined until they conjured up the penumbras they needed for Griswold.
The debate about privacy, if valuable and sincere, is something worthy of the process of Constitutional amendment.
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