Posted on 12/10/2002 11:21:41 AM PST by Liz
Like whist, whilst, and self-abuse, the word sodomy has an old-fashioned ring to it. You don't even see it alluded to much anymore, except in punning tabloid headlines about the situation in Iraq. But it—or its kissin' cousin, the nearly as archaic-sounding "deviate sexual intercourse"—can be found in the criminal codes of thirteen states of the Union, where it is punishable by penalties ranging from a parking-ticket-size fine to (theoretically) ten years in prison.
Even at this late date, many people are vague about just exactly what sodomy is. Montesquieu defined it as "the crime against nature," which is not especially helpful. Blackstone called it "the infamous crime against nature, committed either with man or beast," which gets us a little further, but not much. Back in the U.S.A., the statute books tend to be franker. Some states bring animals into the picture, some don't. The Texas Legislature's definition is nonzoological.
SKIP THIS IF EXPLICIT LANGUAGE OFFENDS. According to Section 21.01 of the Texas Penal Code (readers of delicate sensibilities may at this point wish to skip down a few lines), " 'Deviate sexual intercourse' means: (A) any contact between any part of the genitals of one person and the mouth or anus of another person; or (B) the penetration of the genitals or the anus of another person with an object."
RESUME READING HERE What the Lone Star State does and does not view as some kinda deviated preversion became of national interest last week, when the United States Supreme Court agreed to consider Lawrence v. Texas. The Lawrence of the case is John G. Lawrence, fifty-nine years old, of Houston, who, on the evening of September 17, 1998, was in his apartment with a guest, Tyron Garner, who is thirty-five. Texas got involved when police, having been tipped off by a neighbor that a "weapons disturbance" was in progress, busted down the door. (The tip was a deliberate lie on the part of the neighbor, who was later convicted of filing a false report.)
What the officers found Lawrence and Garner doing is really none of our business, any more than it was any of Texas's; suffice it to say that it was consensual, nonviolent, and noise-free. The two men were arrested, jailed overnight, and eventually fined two hundred dollars each. They appealed, a three-judge panel of a district appeals court reversed their conviction, the full nine-judge appeals court reversed the reversal, and the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals declined to do any more reversing. And so to Washington.
The statute under which Lawrence and Garner were convicted, Section 21.06 of the Texas Penal Code, is officially known as the Homosexual Conduct Law. Ironically, this statute was a product of the progressive mood of the early nineteen-seventies. In most of the states that still criminalize sodomy, it doesn't matter, legally, whether a couple engaging in behavior (A), above, consists of two men, two women, or one of each.
That's how it was in Texas, too, until 1974. In that bell-bottomed year, the Texas Legislature made heterosexual sodomy legal, but it couldn't quite bring itself to do the same for gays. The result is that Texas is now one of only four states (the others being Kansas, Missouri, and Oklahoma) where it is a crime for gays to please each other in ways that are perfectly legal for straights. The panel that overturned the conviction saw this as discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.
The full state court disagreed. Rather, confirming what Anatole France called "the majestic egalitarianism of the law, which forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges," the court pointed out that in Texas homosexuality is illegal for heterosexuals and homosexuals alike. No discrimination there.
According to the Times's Linda Greenhouse, the Supreme Court probably wouldn't have taken the case unless a majority had already decided to "revisit" Bowers v. Hardwick (1986), which upheld the constitutionality of Georgia's sodomy law.
The decision in that case—by a vote of five to four, as with so many of the Court's clunkers—was an embarrassment. Both its language and its reasoning were shockingly coarse. Writing for the majority, Justice Byron White defined "the issue"—leeringly, sarcastically, obtusely, and repeatedly—as "whether the Federal Constitution confers a fundamental right upon homosexuals to engage in sodomy," or protects "a fundamental right to engage in homosexual sodomy," or extends "a fundamental right to homosexuals to engage in acts of consensual sodomy." Any such claim, he added, "is, at best, facetious."
Caricaturing the well-established constitutional right to privacy in this nyah-nyah way is like dismissing the First Amendment as being all about the right to make doo-doo jokes. It was left to the author of the dissenting opinion, Justice Harry Blackmun, to point out, quoting Justice Brandeis, that the case was really "about 'the most comprehensive of rights and the right most valued by civilized men,' namely 'the right to be let alone.' "
Justice Lewis Powell, who tipped the balance in Bowers v. Hardwick, expressed regret years later that he had voted the way he did. He's gone now. John Paul Stevens, who dissented, William Rehnquist, now Chief Justice, and Sandra Day O'Connor are the only holdovers from the Court that upheld Georgia's sodomy law (which, by the way, was thrown out, a few months after Lawrence and Garner were arrested in Houston, by Georgia's supreme court, for violating Georgia's constitution).
Half the states that had sodomy laws when Bowers was decided have got rid of them, and those that still have them seldom enforce them. But when they are enforced the consequences can be more onerous than it may appear. Lawrence and Garner aren't just out four hundred bucks; they may also be banned from certain professions, from nursing to school-bus driving, and are deprived of other privileges denied to persons who have been convicted of "crimes of moral turpitude."
Anyway, sodomy laws are a standing insult to, among others, millions of respectable citizens who happen to be gay. They are an absurd anachronism and an obvious violation of the right to privacy. Whatever they may have represented in Montesquieu's day, or even Byron White's, in 2002 they are nothing but an expression of bigotry. If the Supreme Court takes a truly honest look at Section 21.06 of the Texas Penal Code, it will surely agree with the view of Dickens's Mr. Bumble: this is one case where, at bottom, "the law is a ass."
--SNIP -- Clink on source link for rest of story (go to next)
Supreme Court of New York 1811, in the Case of the People V Ruggles, 8 Johns 545-547, Chief Justice Chancellor Kent Stated:
The defendant was indicted ... in December, 1810, for that he did, on the 2nd day of September, 1810 ... wickedly, maliciously, and blasphemously, utter, and with a loud voice publish, in the presence and hearing of divers good and Christian people, of and concerning the Christian religion, and of and concerning Jesus Christ, the false, scandalous, malicious, wicked and blasphemous words following: "Jesus Christ was a bastard, and his mother must be a whore," in contempt of the Christian religion. .. . The defendant was tried and found guilty, and was sentenced by the court to be imprisoned for three months, and to pay a fine of $500.
The Prosecuting Attorney argued:
While the constitution of the State has saved the rights of conscience, and allowed a free and fair discussion of all points of controversy among religious sects, it has left the principal engrafted on the body of our common law, that Christianity is part of the laws of the State, untouched and unimpaired.
The Chief Justice delivered the opinion of the Court:
Such words uttered with such a disposition were an offense at common law. In Taylor's case the defendant was convicted upon information of speaking similar words, and the Court . . . said that Christianity was parcel of the law, and to cast contumelious reproaches upon it, tended to weaken the foundation of moral obligation, and the efficacy of oaths. And in the case of Rex v. Woolston, on a like conviction, the Court said . . . that whatever strikes at the root of Christianity tends manifestly to the dissolution of civil government. . . . The authorities show that blasphemy against God and . . . profane ridicule of Christ or the Holy Scriptures (which are equally treated as blasphemy), are offenses punishable at common law, whether uttered by words or writings . . . because it tends to corrupt the morals of the people, and to destroy good order. Such offenses have always been considered independent of any religious establishment or the rights of the Church. They are treated as affecting the essential interests of civil society. . . .
We stand equally in need, now as formerly, of all the moral discipline, and of those principles of virtue, which help to bind society together. The people of this State, in common with the people of this country, profess the general doctrines of Christianity, as the rule of their faith and practice; and to scandalize the author of these doctrines is not only ... impious, but . . . is a gross violation of decency and good order. Nothing could be more offensive to the virtuous part of the community, or more injurious to the tender morals of the young, than to declare such profanity lawful.. ..
The free, equal, and undisturbed enjoyment of religious' opinion, whatever it may be, and free and decent discussions on any religious subject, is granted and secured; but to revile ... the religion professed by almost the whole community, is an abuse of that right. . . . We are a Christian people, and the morality of the country is deeply engrafted upon Christianity, and not upon the doctrines or worship of those impostors [other religions].. .. [We are] people whose manners ... and whose morals have been elevated and inspired . . . by means of the Christian religion.
Though the constitution has discarded religious establishments, it does not forbid judicial cognizance of those offenses against religion and morality which have no reference to any such establishment. . . . This [constitutional] declaration (noble and magnanimous as it is, when duly understood) never meant to withdraw religion in general, and with it the best sanctions of moral and social obligation from all consideration and notice of the law. . . . To construe it as breaking down the common law barriers against licentious, wanton, and impious attacks upon Christianity itself, would be an enormous perversion of its meaning. . . . Christianity, in its enlarged sense, as a religion revealed and taught in the Bible, is not unknown to our law. . . . The Court are accordingly of opinion that the judgment below must be affirmed: [that blasphemy against God, and contumelious reproaches, and profane ridicule of Christ or the Holy Scriptures, are offenses punishable at the common law, whether uttered by words or writings].
The Supreme Court in the case of Lidenmuller V The People, 33 Barbour, 561 Stated:
Christianity...is in fact, and ever has been, the religion of the people. The fact is everwhere prominent in all our civil and political history, and has been, from the first, recognized and acted upon by the people, and well as by constitutional conventions, by legislatures and by courts of justice.
The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania 1817, in the Case of The Commonwealth V Wolf stated the courts opinion as follows:
Laws cannot be administered in any civilized government unless the people are taught to revere the sanctity of an oath, and look to a future state of rewards and punishments for the deeds of this life, It is of the utmost moment, therefore, that they should be reminded of their religious duties at stated periods.... A wise policy would naturally lead to the formation of laws calculated to subserve those salutary purposes. The invaluable privilege of the rights of conscience secured to us by the constitution of the commonwealth, was never intended to shelter those persons, who, out of mere caprice, would directly oppose those laws for the pleasure of showing their contempt and abhorrence of the religious opinions of the great mass of the citizens.
The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania 1824, in the Case of Updegraph V The Commonwealth 11 Serg. & R. 393-394, 398-399, 402, 507 (1824) recorded the Courts Declaration that:
Abner Updegraph . . . on the 12th day of December [1821] . . .not having the fear of God before his eyes . . . contriving and intending to scandalize, and bring into disrepute, and vilify the Christian religion and the scriptures of truth, in the Presence and hearing of several persons ... did unlawfully, wickedly and premeditatively, despitefully and blasphemously say . . . : "That the Holy Scriptures were a mere fable: that they were a contradiction, and that although they contained a number of good things, yet they contained a great many lies." To the great dishonor of Almighty God, to the great scandal of the profession of the Christian religion.
The jury . . . finds a malicious intention in the speaker to vilify the Christian religion and the scriptures, and this court cannot look beyond the record, nor take any notice of the allegation, that the words were uttered by the defendant, a member of a debating association, which convened weekly for discussion and mutual information... . That there is an association in which so serious a subject is treated with so much levity, indecency and scurrility ... I am sorry to hear, for it would prove a nursery of vice, a school of preparation to qualify young men for the gallows, and young women for the brothel, and there is not a skeptic of decent manners and good morals, who would not consider such debating clubs as a common nuisance and disgrace to the city. .. . It was the out-pouring of an invective, so vulgarly shocking and insulting, that the lowest grade of civil authority ought not to be subject to it, but when spoken in a Christian land, and to a Christian audience, the highest offence conna bones mores; and even if Christianity was not part of the law of the land, it is the popular religion of the country, an insult on which would be indictable.
The assertion is once more made, that Christianity never was received as part of the common law of this Christian land; and it is added, that if it was, it was virtually repealed by the constitution of the United States, and of this state. . . . If the argument be worth anything, all the laws which have Christianity for their object--all would be carried away at one fell swoop-the act against cursing and swearing, and breach of the Lord's day; the act forbidding incestuous marriages, perjury by taking a false oath upon the book, fornication and adultery ...for all these are founded on Christianity--- for all these are restraints upon civil liberty. ...
We will first dispose of what is considered the grand objection--the constitutionality of Christianity--for, in effect, that is the question. Christianity, general Christianity, is and always has been a part of the common law . . . not Christianity founded on any particular religious tenets; not Christianity with an established church ... but Christianity with liberty of conscience to all men.
Thus this wise legislature framed this great body of laws, for a Christian country and Christian people. This is the Christianity of the common law . . . and thus, it is irrefragably proved, that the laws and institutions of this state are built on the foundation of reverence for Christianity. . . . In this the constitution of the United States has made no alteration, nor in the great body of the laws which was an incorporation of the common-law doctrine of Christianity . . . without which no free government can long exist.
To prohibit the open, public and explicit denial of the popular religion of a country is a necessary measure to preserve the tranquillity of a government. Of this, no person in a Christian country can complain. . . . In the Supreme Court of New York it was solemnly determined, that Christianity was part of the law of the land, and that to revile the Holy Scriptures was an indictable offence. The case assumes, says Chief Justice Kent, that we are a Christian people, and the morality of the country is deeply engrafted on Christianity. The People v. Ruggles.
No society can tolerate a willful and despiteful attempt to subvert its religion, no more than it would to break down its laws--a general, malicious and deliberate intent to overthrow Christianity, general Christianity. Without these restraints no free government could long exist. It is liberty run mad to declaim against the punishment of these offences, or to assert that the punishment is hostile to the spirit and genius of our government. They are far from being true friends to liberty who support this doctrine, and the promulgation of such opinions, and general receipt of them among the people, would be the sure forerunners of anarchy, and finally, of despotism. No free government now exists in the world unless where Christianity is acknowledged, and is the religion of the country.... Its foundations are broad and strong, and deep. .. it is the purest system of morality, the firmest auxiliary, and only stable support of all human laws. . . .
Christianity is part of the common law; the act against blasphemy is neither obsolete nor virtually repealed; nor is Christianity inconsistent with our free governments or the genius of the people.
While our own free constitution secures liberty of conscience and freedom of religious worship to all, it is not necessary to maintain that any man should have the right publicly to vilify the religion of his neighbors and of the country; these two privileges are directly opposed.
The Supreme Court of the State of South Carolina in 1846 in the case of City of Charleston V S.A. Benjamin cites an individual who broke the Ordinance that stated: "No Person or persons whatsoever shall publicly expose to sale, or sell... any goods, wares or merchandise whatsoever upon the Lord's day." The court convicted the man and came to the conclusion: "I agree fully to what is beautifully and appropriately said in Updengraph V The Commonwealth.... Christianity, general Christianity, is an always has been, a part of the common law; "not Christianity with an established church... but Christianity with liberty of conscience to all men."
"The Bible is the Rock on which this Republic rests."President Andrew Jackson
"Providence has given to our people the choice of their rulers. And it is the duty as well as the privilege and interest, of a Christian nation to select and prefer Christians for their rulers." First Chief Justice of Supreme Court John Jay
"Human law must rest its authority ultimately upon the authority of that law which is divine....Far from being rivals or enemies, religion and law are twin sisters, friends, and mutual assistants. Indeed, these two sciences run into each other."James Wilson, a signer of the Constitution and an original Justice on the U.S. Supreme Court
"Let the children...be carefully instructed in the principles and obligations of the Christian religion. This is the most essential part of education. The great enemy of the salvation of man, in my opinion, never invented a more effectual means of extirpating [removing] Christianity from the world than by persuading mankind that it was improper to read the Bible at schools."Benjamin Rush
"It is no slight testimonial, both to the merit and worth of Christianity, that in all ages since its promulgation the great mass of those who have risen to eminence by their profound wisdom and integrity have recognized and reverenced Jesus of Nazareth as the Son of the living God."President John Quincy Adams
"The general principles on which the fathers achieved independence were.... the general principles of Christianity."President John Quincy Adams
"The Bible is worth all other books which have ever been printed."Patrick Henry
"The religion which has introduced civil liberty is the religion of Christ and His Apostles.... This is genuine Christianity and to this we owe our free constitutions of government."Noah Webster
"Whether this [new government] will prove a blessing or a curse will depend upon the use our people make of the blessings which a gracious God hath bestowed on us. If they are wise, they will be great and happy. If they are of a contrary character, they will be miserable. Righteousness alone can exalt them as a nation [Proverbs 14:34]. Reader! Whoever thou art, remember this, and in thy sphere practice virtue thyself and encourage it in others."Patrick Henry
"I have lived, sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth -- God Governs in the Affairs of Men, And if a Sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His notice, Is it possible that an empire can rise without His aid?"Benjamin Franklin
"Except the Lord build the house, They labor in vain who build it." "I firmly believe this."Benjamin Franklin, 1787, Constitutional Convention
"Such being the impressions under which I have, in obedience to the public summons, repaired to the present station, it would be peculiarly improper to omit in this first official act, my fervent supplications to that Almighty Being, who rules over the universe, who presides in the council of nations, and whose providential aids can supply every human defect, that His benediction may consecrate to the liberties and happiness of the people of the United States.." "...Every step by which they have advanced to the character of an independent nation, seems to have been distinguished by some token of providential agency" From President George Washington's Inaugural Address, April 30th, 1789, addressed to both Houses of Congress.
President Washingtons Thanksgiving Day Proclamation, 1789
"It is impossible to rightly govern the world without God and the Bible"President George Washington, September 17th, 1796
"Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports . . . And let us indulge with caution the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion . . . Reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail to the exclusion of religious principle." President George Washington
"...The Smiles of Heaven can never be expected On a Nation that disregards the eternal rules of Order and Right, which Heaven Itself Ordained."President George Washington
It is hoped that by God's assistance, some of the continents in the Ocean will be discovered....for the Glory of God. Christopher Columbus
The Mayflower Compact, November 11th, 1620
"All persons living in this province, who confess and acknowledge the One Almighty and Eternal God to be the Creator, Upholder, and Ruler of the world, and that hold themselves obliged in conscience to live peaceably and justly in civil society, shall in no wise be molested or prejudiced for their religious persuasion or practice, in matters of faith and worship; nor shall they be compelled at any time to frequent or maintain any religious worship, place or ministry whatsoever." April 25, 1662- William Penn signed this to establish religious liberty in the new provence of (Pennsylvania).
Excerpts from the Declaration to take up arms, July 6th, 1775
Declaration of Independence, July 4th, 1776
"It cannot be emphasized too strongly or too often that this great nation was founded not by religionists but by Christians, not on religion but on the Gospel of Jesus Christ.","Give me liberty or give me death."Patrick Henry of the Constitutional Convention
"A general dissolution of Principles and Manners will more surely overthrow the Liberties of America than the whole Force of the common enemy. While the people are virtuous they cannot be subdued; but when once they lose their virtue they will be ready to surrender their liberties to the first external or internal invader . . . If virtue and knowledge are diffused among the people, they will never be enslaved. This will be their great security."Samuel Adams, 1779
"The philosophy of the school room in one generation will be the philosophy of government in the next." Abraham Lincoln.
"The only assurance of our nation's safety is to lay our foundation in morality and religion."Abraham Lincoln.
"Intelligence, patriotism, Christianity, and a firm reliance, are still competent to adjust, in the best way, all our present difficulty" Abraham Lincoln.
"The fundamental basis of this nation's law was given to Moses on the Mount. The fundamental basis of our Bill of Rights comes from the teaching we get from Exodus and St. Matthew, from Isaiah and St. Paul. I don't think we emphasize that enough these days. If we don't have the proper fundamental moral background, we will finally end up with a totalitarian government which does not believe in the right for anybody except the state.President Harry S. Truman.
Statesmen, my dear Sir, may plan and speculate for liberty, but it is Religion and Morality alone, which can establish the Principles upon which Freedom can securely stand. John Adams
"The only foundation of a free Constitution is pure Virtue, and if this cannot be inspired into our People in a greater Measure, than they have it now, they may change their Rulers and the forms of Government, but they will not obtain a lasting liberty." John Adams
"We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge, or gallantry, would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other." John Adams
"Religion and virtue are the only foundations, not only of all free government, but of social felicity under all governments and in all the combinations of human society." John Adams
"The highest glory of the American Revolution was this; it connected in one indissoluble bond the principles of civil government with the principles of Christianity. John Quincy Adams
"From the day of the Declaration...they (the American people) were bound by the laws of God, which they all, and by the laws of The Gospel, which they nearly all, acknowledge as the rules of their conduct." John Quincy Adams
"Man, considered as a creature, must necessarily be subject to the laws of his Creator, for he is entirely a dependent being....And, consequently, as man depends absolutely upon his Maker for everything, it is necessary that he should in all points conform to his Maker's will...this will of his Maker is called the law of nature. These laws laid down by God are the eternal immutable laws of good and evil...This law of nature dictated by God himself, is of course superior in obligation to any other. It is binding over all the globe, in all countries, and at all times: no human laws are of any validity if contrary to this... Sir William Blackstone
"Blasphemy against the Almighty is denying his being or providence, or uttering contumelious reproaches on our Savior Christ. It is punished, at common law by fine and imprisonment, for Christianity is part of the laws of the land. Sir William Blackstone
"The preservation of Christianity as a national religion is abstracted from its own intrinsic truth, of the utmost consequence to the civil state, which a single instance will sufficiently demonstrate. Sir William Blackstone
"I have carefully examined the evidences of the Christian religion, and if I was sitting as a juror upon its authenticity I would unhesitatingly give my verdict in its favor. I can prove its truth as clearly as any proposition ever submitted to the mind of man. Alexander Hamilton
"It cannot be emphasized too strongly or too often that this great nation was founded, not by religionists, but by Christians; not on religions, but on the Gospel of Jesus Christ. For this very reason peoples of other faiths have been afforded asylum, prosperity, and freedom of worship here." Patrick Henry
"The Bible is worth all other books which have ever been printed." Patrick Henry
"Bad men cannot make good citizens. A vitiated state of morals, a corrupted public conscience are incompatible with freedom." Patrick Henry
"It is when people forget God that tyrants forge their chains." Patrick Henry
"Providence has given to our people the choice of their rulers, and it is the duty, as well as the privilege and interest of our Christian nation to select and prefer Christians for their rulers. John Jay
"Religion is the only solid basis of good morals; therefore education should teach the precepts of religion, and the duties of man toward God." Gouverneur Morris
"If thou wouldst rule well, thou must rule for God, and to do that, thou must be ruled by him....Those who will not be governed by God will be ruled by tyrants." William Penn
"By removing the Bible from schools we would be wasting so much time and money in punishing criminals and so little pains to prevent crime. Take the Bible out of our schools and there would be an explosion in crime." Benjamin Rush
IMHO, this is all about blowing a hole in the 14th admenment.
"Equal Protection under the law" means the law is enforced equally,
-not-
All laws must be written equally.
Because it does no violate equal rights of others. Yes, various religions say that murder is wrong, etc. They also say that it's ok to do bad things to non-believers. Which is why state should be secular. Besides, I know that murder is wrong and I've never read any religious texts. How can that be? Regards.
And you have no right, nor the authority to use force and the governments gun to prevent and make criminal what my wife and I do sexually in our home between consenting adults.
Your attempt to appeal to the founders is at best, facetious.
| To: FF578 "Jesus Christ was a bastard, and his mother must be a whore" 65 posted on 12/10/2002 3:16 PM EST by BikerNYC To: BikerNYC Yes. 66 posted on 12/10/2002 3:18 PM EST by FF578 |
You cant be serious. Being in prison would paradise compared to what God would judge. Leave it to God to enforce it.
I've postulated that the 3 men conspired together to get the couple arrested so that they would have a court case to use to overturn the law. From the outset, the "defendants" proclaimed how they were going to use this charge to overturn the law (making them "plantiffs" in a sense).
The 2 men committing an act of homosexual sodomy left their door (deliberately?) unlocked. When police arrived to respond to the emergency call, they did not need to disturb the men to gain entry. They discovered the 2 men in their bedroom still having sex (nothing I've read indicated or denied that the officers announced their presence upon entering the residence).
I just can't find pro or anti sodomy clauses anywhere in the Constitution. They must be in there somewhere because the Supremes are going to rule on it. It must be in there... the clause just before or after abortion and separation of church and state.
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