Judge-made determinations of age of consent tend to be limited to specific cases that turn on the peculiar facts of the case, as where a judge determines that 16 year-old child is emancipated from his or her parents. But even there a state legislature can sharply circumscribe or even deny a judge the power to make the determination and even limit how far the consent may be legally acknowledged.
What has happened here is something else entirely. Five life-tenured liberal members of the Supreme Court, without any of the citizen participatory debate and input found at a state legislative level, have decided after looking at some dubious pieces of international law commentary cherry-picked from their favorite elitist legal authors, they are wiser than any state legislature and that their wisdom must be forced upon the benighted proles at the state level. This isn't about debating difficult issues in a republic. This is about a tiny group of unelected elitist liberals shutting down all debate in a republic.
On this thread alone, there has been more extended and earnest debate by dozens more citizens on both sides of the issue than there was at the Supreme Court. To what end? As important as this issue is, as much fervent debate as it has generated at FR, all further discussion is pointless because a more five members of the Supreme Court have taken the debate off the table.
I think that's sad.
It is sad...generally I am of an extreme conservative, almost libertarian bent. I guess in this case I was playing the part of Devil's advocate.
You're right also, in the fact that a concensus is only reached through much debate. That's why I like Free Republic so much!