Bowers v. Hardwick and Lawrence v. Texas are two landmark decisions of the Supreme Court of United State - made 17 years apart - that demonstrate the sea change in the attitude and outlook of the American judicial system and indeed the American life in general, towards homosexuality.
In the earlier decision, Bowers v Hardwick of 1986, the court upheld the constitutionality of a Georgia law that criminalized anal and oral sex even between consenting adults in the privacy of their home. This ruling was overturned in the 2003 Lawrence V Texas ruling which basically asserted the rights of the individual to privacy and struck down sodomy laws in thirteen states and made same-sex activity legal throughout the United States.
[...] The one impact of the Bowers v. Hardwick case ruling was the fact that it equated an “illegal” activity with a particular group of people homosexuals and thus meant that it was singling out this group of people in the population for censure and for stigmatization on grounds of their lifestyle that they led, which flies against the constitution and the bill of rights. Justice Thomas felt that the Texas law against sodomy was “uncommonly silly” and that punishing a person for the expression of their sexual orientation was an undue waste of law enforcement resources In the Bowers v. [...]
[...] AS the world and the US started dealing with the impact of this disease and after it was found to be not just one for hemophiliacs, Haitians and homosexuals as it was originally characterized, the real honest and open discussions about homosexuality and sexual orientation were started and crystallized in the greater acceptance and understanding in the general society In their ruling on the Bowers v. Hardwick case, the Supreme Court Justices ruled that sodomy was not a fundamental right. [...]
[...] 2.At the time of the Bowers v. A Hardwick case in 1986, the American public's attitude toward homosexuality was very conservative. In fact as late as 1988, only of Americans were in support of same-sex marriages while 67.6 were opposed to it. By 2004 however the percentage in support had jumped to over 30% while the percentage of those opposed to same sex marriages was down to less than 50% (Harms, 2011). Thus the American society was undergoing significant change in their opinions and attitudes towards homosexuality and same-sex relations. [...]
[...] (2011). In Americans move dramatically toward acceptance of homosexuality, survey finds. Retrieved May from http://news.uchicago.edu/article/2011/09/28/americans-move- dramatically-toward-acceptance-homosexuality-survey-finds Querbes, S. (2004). In The Supreme Court, Sodomy Laws and the Impact of the LGBT Movement in America. Retrieved May from http://www.albany.edu/womensstudies/journal/2004/querbes.htm Strasser, M. (2006). Lawrence, Mill, And Same-Sex Relationships: On Values, Valuing, And The Constitution. Southern California Interdisciplinary Law Journal, 15(285), 285-306. Retrieved May from http://mylaw2.usc.edu/why/students/orgs/ilj/assets/docs/15- 2%20Strasser.pdf Tassinari, L. [...]
[...] 1.There were numerous societal factors that led the US Supreme Court to abandon the rule of stare decisis. The stare decisis is a principle that basically holds that judges usually allow previously made decisions to stand. In the case of Lawrence v. Texas the Supreme Court saw need to completely rule in the opposite of the judgment in Bowers v. Hardwick due mainly to the changes in attitudes, perceptions and views on homosexuality in the country (Harms, 2011). In 1986 when the initial Bowers v. [...]
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