excuse me...but am I first???

And Dickie Gephardt is even smarter than the court.

Aren't we lucky he's running for President.

wooohooo,wow what a rush. well now down to the Surpeme court usurping "STATES RIGHTS" what happened to the 9th and 10th amendments??? the question they deliberated on is not the problem... it is the symptom of over turning the decisions legistated by the people...was this what the Supreme Court was set up to do???? the liberal ploy is to circumvent the will of the people/states rights with Legal court rullings..I'm sorry if I say this inept but..well heck I'm old

As a recent immigrant to Texas, I must explain that it isn't stupidity driving the decision-making process in this former independent republic, it is simply egomania derived from the joy of being here in Texas. Texans explain that, "It ain't braggin' if'n its true." A corollary would be that "It ain't stupid if'n it works." The justice simply doesn't understand that what works in Texas won't necessarily work (and may seem stupid) elsewhere, due to a lack of Texans to make it work. And, yes, I am from North Carolina, but left when it became far too silly to continue explaining to my friends in Texas.

Let's make a deal: if the state government will stay out of the citizens' bedrooms, then the Federal government will stay out of the states' govenments.
Sounds fair.

I went on the record below saying that Roe v Wade was not supported by the constitution. I will now say that, despite my respect for the dissenters (especially Scalia), I think they got this one right. I haven't read the opinion, and I think Kennedy is too hung up on the homosexual prestige thing from the news paper excerts, but there is really no difference (health wise, or family values wise) b/t hetero and homosexual sodomy outside of marriage. Such a law applied to married couples would be unconstitutional easilty, even under conservative S.Ct. precedence. I just don't think there is a rational basis for Texas' law.

And yes, the Court is supposed to recognize states rights (which are usually in conflict with Congress trying to control states), but it is also obligated to strike down laws violating the constitution.

BTW, I think the Police article is funnier than this one.

well well anther person I suppose who defended Mr.Clinton with "it's only about sex, thats private".... compleetly ignoring the facts of the case "it was LIEING to the court after being sworn in...to tell the truth"

Clearly the citizens of Texas are too dumb to run their state without supervision. Many of them vote for Democrats who run off and hide in Oklahoma to prevent a vote on legislation.
Anyone who picks Oklahoma, instead of Mexico, to hide out in is clearly a moron. I've been to both. Do you know how much more fun Mexico is than Oklahoma? So much fun that I don't remember what happened. But I remember every decade-long minute of the weekend I was in Oklahoma. Ugh!

OOL:

Not even close. Adult, consentual sex is private. I didn't ask to find out about Monica. Lying under oath about sex, when it is relevant to the lawsuit, as it was in the Jones litigation, is a crime, and everything Clinton got, he deserved (actually, he deserved more, such as conviction on his impeachment). This sodomy case is not about Clinton.

Is it OK in your mind for the government to legislate the consentual sex acts b/t husband and wife, too? B/c old, pre-Warren supreme court cases would suggest that you can't. Thus, the question, for me, is there a rational basis to treat only homosexuals different. There isn't.

Was going to post this elsewhere- but too many irons in the fire. I am not a lawyer- or do I play one on television. But why don't the legislators make the laws and put asterisks beside them. At the bottom of the law- it will state all who are exempted!!

It makes sense and would save a tremendous amount of time and money, prisons wouldn't be as full, and there wouldn't be all of the silly 'courtroom television shows on any more!

Some examples- if you or someone else in the car is about to deliver a baby- speed limits aren't enforced, or if you are a police officer.

If you are rich and famous- well, we all know you can get away with murder....

If you are in the city that wins a 'world' championship- you are legally exempted from breaking the law to vandalize, be an arsonist, public drunkenness and looting.

If mommmy and or daddy didn't treat you nicely as a child- you can do whatever you want!

Now everyone would have to register their 'issues', and carry documentation or that issue! You must allow atleast 7-10 business days to get authorization for a new one. So all of you people who are thinking about getting back at that former special someone- you have to wait until you exemption is legal.

Being a middle class, caucasian from a small town in PA- I am not exemted from any laws- so I have to be a 'good' boy! But I know there are a lot of issues out there.....

At least then everyone would know what the rules really are!

Sneakerbrains unite!

H.o.D.

People who want the government to pick their sex partners are too stupid to run their own state. I'd make them eat with a spork.

Great suggestions. In the meantime, I wish Penn State luck this year so you can legally vandalize.

It's about time Bowers was overturned.
"You are free to engage in any consentual sexual behavior except for anything we think is 'icky'."

Well, I lived in Texas for a number of years, and I'm not sure so sure this is really satirical...they really MAY be too stupid to run their own state. I feel lucky to have made it out alive with a little bit of sanity...:)

Got a brother that still lives there and he is the worst racist, sexist, anti-everything scary person I have ever met.

Can someone point out where in the constitution the "Right to Privacy" is stated? I can find something about unreasonable search and seizures, but nothing about this whole "you can do anything you want to in private" thing. Seems that I should be able to smoke a joint in private too, that doesn't hurt anyone but myself as long as I don't go out in public, so if I grow it and smoke, that should be ok..right? Seems to me the law is ok as long as cops without probable cause don't start busting down doors...

In this context, there are 3 main cases that the Court used to come to their decision. The first is Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 (1965). That case struck down a law outlawing the sale and use of contraceptives. The Court held that part of the "liberty" in the Due Process clause was to free from unwarranted government intrusion in deciding whether or not to have a child, and engaging in sexual activity for "nonprocreative purposes."
The same sort of liberty was the root of the second case, Eisenstadt v. Baird, 405 U.S. 438 (1972), which struck down a similar law limiting catraceptive use and sales but this time to unmarried people. Again, it was the "liberty" to engage in sexual activity for "nonprocreative purposes" and the Equal Pritection clause of the 14th. In a nutshell, the Court said that if a couple wanted to purchase contraceptives, so they could engage in consentual sex, then the government could not take action to deprive them of this while allowing married couples to do so.
Which leads us to the third case, Bowers v. Hardwick, 487 U.S. 186 (19??). This was a Georgia case concerning sodomy. The law in question outlawed certain acts that the Georgia legislature thought were "icky." The statute did not specify gender in the law: same sex, differnt gender didn't matter. The Court's decision basically said that the Due Process and Equal Protection clauses didn't give you the right to be homosexual. Kind of tortured reasoning, because while it does NOT confer that right, neither does it anywhere say that the government can regulate consentual sex between adults. It says that without a durned good reason, the government can't deprive you of life, liberty, etc. And that even if it does have a durned good reason, it had better treat everyone the same, and follow all of the rules for taking it.

The Court decided that the most private act between two consenting adults, in the most private place (in the home) are not something the govenment has any business messing with.
Gay, straight or whatever.

Private morality is none of the government's business.

SRG...
I have read your posts here before, and I always came away thinking "...and he's a smart fella, too."
Now I doubt myself....

Private morality is none of the government's bisiness? Where did you get that idea, 1968? Have you lost your mind? This decision by the USSC is nothing more that hide behind the verbiage intellectual sophistry. And you, a thinking human being, fell for it.

You may think that the government has no business in the bedroom of consenting adults, but that isn't what this decision says. It is saying that if it feels good, do it.

Two consenting adults? You do remember Dr. Jack Kevorkian, don't you? That involved two consenting adults, too, unless I am mistaken. And, since adults seems to be the operative term, does it matter if both are alive? Is necrophelia now acceptable? In your own bedroom, you understand...

A married man and woman, begetting children, are, along with the rule of law, the basis of any civil society. Sodomy is not. Why? Because the act occomplishes nothing, other than making someone 'feel good'.

Do we really need the USSC to tell us that?

Old Marine

Does "consentual sexual activity" have anything to do with Smilin' Jack?
(on a side note: if somebody decides to check out voluntarily, why is this a bad thing?)

Eating Twinkies feels good, and accomplishes nothing.

Necrophilia? Not my bag. Also, that was two consenting adults. Not one wierdo and one spoiling piece of meat.

And no, private morality is not the government's business. Never should be. It is the legislature's place to determine what is and is not lawful.
It is up to each person, and whatever belief structure they live by, to determine what is and is not moral.
Morality by legislation is the worst form of theocracy because it hides behind a thin veneer of democracy.

Sailor, I'm not gonna come into your house and tell you what you are doing is immoral. Please don't try to come into mine, via the government, and tell me that what I do is wrong.

Kennedy later said, "So who wants to be President, our 'Gig' is the one to have. We seek approval from no one, and no one can tell us what to do! MUH HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA,-------AHH!--------------MUH HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

SRG did a great job outlining the Supreme Court's analysis prior analysis, and applying starie decisis, you easily get to today's ruling. I gave a cliff note analysis earlier in this string. My rationale is related, but perhaps not on point with what the Court actually reasoned.

Perhaps the best reason for overturning the Texas law was the rationale given by Texas for the law. Ignore the "right to privacy" for a moment.

There are two basic principles that even most conservative justices follow: All laws must be rationally letated to a legitimate government purpose (the due process clause); any distinction between dissimilarly situated people in the law must have a rational basis (equal protection clause).

Texas argued two points: (1) supporting the family and (2) health. Remember, the law ONLY applied to homosexuals.

(1) Is outlawing private, consentual sodomy between two homosexual people rationally related to "supporting the family structure?" I don't think so, and I think the case for such a rationale is Ally McBeal thin. While legislatures are given a lot of defference under the rational basis test, if I see a law so invasive of private, consentual conduct with such a weak rational, I'm striking it.

(2) Health: Is buggering b/t two unmarried men any more unhealthy than buggering b/t two unmarried heterosexuals? If the rationale is STD's, anal bleeding, or whatever, the answer is no. A female butt is just as (if not more) receptive to tearing, receiving AIDS or other diseases, etc. as the male butt. Is there a legimate basis for the distinction, if your rationale is health? No. Why the difference in the law? Either b/c the legislature knew the law would be overturned if it applied to all heterosexuals (primarily b/c the justices probably would have ruled 9-0 if applied to married people) or b/c Texans don't like those icki people. Either way, it fails the equal protection test.

That is a simple, constitutional reason, w/o privacy, as to why the law should have been struck down.

Also, the law was an absurd invasion of privacy. Regardless of the constitutional reasons for striking it down (not all laws I disagree with are unconsitutional), all conservatives (you know, the small government people) should have been outraged that Texas would pass such an intrusive law that outlaws conduct that does not deprive anyone of life, liberty or property w/o force or fraud. But that is the difference b/t a libertarian conservative and a Republican conservative.

The case was a sham. The cops in Texas don't go around kicking in bedroom doors to arrest consenting adults practicing icky sex. The arrest that initiated the case was staged so that the law could be challenged and, reasonably enough, overturned. While the jails in Texas may be filled with people practicing sodomy, that's not what put them there.

KJ writes, "Adult, consentual sex is private..."

Ummm, no KJ that is incorrect. I can cite numerous examples where such adult consensual sex has been put into evidence in a criminal proceeding or civil proceeding, and certainly used as the basis for divorce proceeding more certainly than any other reasons. Even intramarital sex makes it into the public court for a wide variety of reasons. So adult sex is not always private. In my town of residence, Tacoma, WA it has been on and off again front page news for about two months now because of a murder - and there is only an investigation at this point, no criminal or civil proceeding have begun.

Why is it KJ that Americans now think that smoking is something that is wholly unprivate more and more so even in ones own home, but sex is to be considered to be completely a private affair? Is drug use a private affair, or does it have societal ramifications? How about alcohol abuse, it is legal? Consider that no physical abuse occurs, but intoxification is frequent and severe by the 'provider' -- private???
What about religion? Is is within ones privacy 'rights' to sacrifice (NOTE to L.F.C. -- turn your head) cats as part of one's religion?
How about even prayer? Can a patriarch demand that prayer or worship arise from his family, his little ones, the infirm, for long hours and at odd hours on a regular basis? -- Private???

What about even burial? A private affair? Why is there some limitation for using one's property to bury one's dead or to demand one's own burial upon at death? - isn't that a very private thing?

What about business? Can any manner of home business be conducted in a residence? Even in a merchant's district? - shouldn't that be protected by 'the right to privacy,' to have say a machine shop in a open air tourist mall if the owner owns that land isn't it his private right to operate as he desires no matter what covenants or aggreements he made when he purchased his lot?

Consider my private right to play my stereo really loud in my neighborhood? Or even have sex really loud? What if it is the only way I truely feel fulfilled musically (or sexually)? Private right???

Or consider my 'private right' to not bath, or change or wash my clothes?

What about my 'private right' to stop brushing my teeth?

My county insists that I not accumulate garbage on my property? Don't I have a private right to do so?

AND now look at the whole thing the other way - the way Scalia looked at it -- What business is it of the Feds to determine local ordinances or state statutes on garbage or noise or zoning? In effect Kennedy said that such ordinances are null as void when the robed nine say as such. It is the destruction of Federalism - this path that we are on and with that comes centralization and of course with that tyranny.

Idiocy!!!

Because it is so often misunderstood I think I should point out that there is no such thing as state's rights.

State do not have rights.
States have powers (granted to them by the people).
People have rights (and powers).

If 2 consenting adults want to break the laws of nature in the privacy of their own home i guess that i can handle that. The problem here is that they too rarely leave it at home. Queer folk nowadays love to throw their "lifestyle" choice into the public spectrum with their gay parades and pride days. I'll tolerate their right to a disgusting lifestyle when the tolerate my right to find it immoral and appalling.

It was Adam and Eve not Adam and Steve.

Jericho:

I will answer the numerous (irrelevant) questions you posed to me. Let me make a few quick points.

B/c something is private does not mean that it cannot be relevant in a private dispute or even as evidence in a criminal case. Private sex isn't admissible b/c it is the subject of the lawsuit or criminal proceeding, but b/c it shows (in your examples) (1) breach of contract of marriage or (2) it is relevant to the elements of the sexual harrassment suit (BTW, this involves commercial activity which gives the state more powers) or (3) sex shows motive, relationship, intimacy (whatever) in a criminal case.

As for all of your privacy questions, let me say again -- rational basis. What is the reason for the law? If the reason is "we just don't like it," and the conduct is not commericial in nature, that might not be enough. But I explained why I thought the law was unconstitution w/o relying on privacy.

The questions are typical Chicken Little Slippery Slope stuff. I admit that one step in one direction makes the second step closer, but that doesn't mean we don't admit that the first step is right.

I'll answer your questions:

Is drug use a private affair, or does it have societal ramifications? It could be if it doesn't involve commercial activity. But it can probably survive the "rational" basis test on health related reasons for regulation.

How about alcohol abuse, it is legal? Uh, yes, it is legal. Doing certain things while drunk, eg, abusing people or driving, isn't. And selling to a drunk person isn't, but involves commercial activity and is designed to prevent drunk crime. BTW, the States have very broad powers to regulate all things alcohol b/c it is written in the constitution as the 21st Amendment.

What about religion? Is is within ones privacy 'rights' to sacrifice (NOTE to L.F.C. -- turn your head) cats as part of one's religion?
This involves the 1st Amendment. Actually, the S.Ct. nixed a Miami law that barred animal sacrifice in religous ceremony b/c it didn't apply to all animal killing, ie, it discriminated against religion. If you want to outlaw all cat killing, that would probably survive, but it would make animal control difficult.

How about even prayer? It is called the free exercise clause, see 1st Amendment.

Can a patriarch demand that prayer or worship arise from his family, his little ones, the infirm, for long hours and at odd hours on a regular basis? -- Private??? First Amendment question -- the State can bar abuse, even in the name of religion. Note how your examples involve abuse (non-consentual) conduct, unlike the sodomy case.

What about even burial? Why is there some limitation for using one's property to bury one's dead or to demand one's own burial upon at death?
Land use has long been deemed regulatable. Burial ceremonies, however, would get some protection under the 1st Amendment.

What about business? Can any manner of home business be conducted in a residence? Land use and commercial activity. Parking issues, traffic issues, etc. See, you keep going outside of true privacy issues.

Even in a merchant's district? - shouldn't that be protected by 'the right to privacy,' to have say a machine shop in a open air tourist mall if the owner owns that land isn't it his private right to operate as he desires no matter what covenants or aggreements he made when he purchased his lot? ABSURD. Contracts involve property rights. This is just stupid.

Consider my private right to play my stereo really loud in my neighborhood? Or even have sex really loud? What if it is the only way I truely feel fulfilled musically (or sexually)? Private right??? NO. Is this really your logic? You can have loud music and sex in private if you don't create a public disturbance [Note: public is the opposite of private] outside of your private realm. But that is not the assumption of your question. Public homosexual (and heterosexual) activity is still a crime even after the S.Ct. opinion yesterday.

Or consider my 'private right' to not bathe, or change or wash my clothes? I am not aware of that being a crime. I have the right to fire you if you come to work stinky.

What about my 'private right' to stop brushing my teeth? Duh!

My county insists that I not accumulate garbage on my property? Don't I have a private right to do so? Land use again. Also, this will involve potential polution problems, smell problems, water run off, etc, that involves neighboring land. Not even relevant, and not private.

There. Any other irrelevant questions?

You post on state's rights is a good one. I would just add that the term is properly employed in the context of a struggle b/t the state and Feds, not states and the people.

Sorry I was a little snippy and sarcastic above. Not enough sleep.

BTW, saying something is legal (and even can't be made illegal under the constitution) is not the same as saying it is moral, right, or that I have to accept and applaud you for it. Lots of sexual activity (basically, any before or outside of marriage) is a sin according to what I believe, and I do not claim to be free of sin. But that doesn't make me a criminal. My constant speeding to work makes me a criminal.

No comment offered.

Just smiling and contemplating the various facets of the original story.

Good one Scott.

;)

KJ,
Thanks, I was going to answer, but I got caught up at work.

And to address the cat question again:

"Eating kittens is just plain..plain WRONG! And no one should do it ever!" -- The Tick

"Spoooooooooonnn!"
--The Tick

I happen to think that such acts go above and beyond "icky". If they would stop showing off, holding parades, GSA meetings at schools and colleges (Why would any normal person go to one?), and generally making a 'private' problem public, THEN AND ONLY THEN is it not the government's business. It's also my right NOT to hear about it, and if they don't respect my rights, I'll not respect theirs, and elect people who won't, either. Sickos.

Food for thought: Canada's legislature is considering a bill to legalize gay and lesbian marriage. The same-sex couples will have all the same rights and privileges accorded to heterosexual married couple.

See Canada's side of the Niagra falls with its casinos and wedding chapels turn into a "Gay Vegas."

I think I'll stay far away from there... Yuck.

In the words of Guy (in Galaxy Quest): "Hey, thatís not right! Eeewwww."

KJ - Let me start at the end - No, the term 'states rights' is not properly defined in the struggle between the states and the Federal government. That term is an oxymoron.

The 10th amendment, as well as the body of the Constitution defined that division of powers - the division was noted in the Federalist papers as Federalism.

No state, neither nation state nor country has a right to anything. All states/countries operate with powers granted to them by the people. Just because poplular media and culture misunderstands this fact does not make it in error.

As for 'the right to privacy' of course I was operating in the absurb. It is an absurd concept. We have a God given right of liberty which is be redefined into a government given right to privacy. Our society is headed toward a devaluation of all institutions except government and the individual. That any individual can now operate any absurdity under the pretext of privacy will become more and more apparent. Now, increasingly, only by his link to the central government will a man be restrained and that will be a very long leash, but a leash it will be.

The basis of Justice Scalia's opinion is that he knows this 'freedom' toward the absurb will abound as local government close to the people declines in favor of a government far removed. Jackbooted federal and eventually world yanks on that chain will occur whenever that elite power seeks another bag of gold. Would that elite centralized power actually care if I did blast my stereo whether it violated some world ordinance or not? Not as long as the taxes still roll in, and certainly not in a timely manner if their was enforcement.

The 'right to privacy' will now quickly go beyond killing ones baby and sexual relations. I don't predict where it will rear its head next, but it is unlikely to involve something in the bedroom or body, except possibly drug use.

The destruction of federalism and the centralization of power while anarchy grows at the local level will move forward rapidly. Now that the central government is ruling on such matters under the guise of 'privacy rights' and we are having billions of dollars spent on such things as federal call screening the triviality of federal law is increasingly absurd, is unenforceable, and will generate chaos locally.

But such is the nature of life when the citzenry seek enslavement to alleviate their boredom.

" Supreme Court: Texans Too Stupid To Rule State "

-----------

They may be too stupid to rule the state but not the federal government...

A Texan by the name of "George W. Bush" has accomplished in 3 years time what the guy from Arkansas named William 'Bill' Clinton failed to do in 8 years..

GWB chased away the Taliban and the Al-Qaida from Afghanistan.. Not satisfied, he ousted Saddam Hussein and the Baath Party from Iraq -- effectively controlling the second largest known oil reserve..

If everything goes according to his plan, OPEC will be doomed in 2 years time----putting oil prices under the condition of open market economy.

Clearly this Texan is the 2nd best president after Ronald Reagan...

The Supreme Court's opinion in Lawrence v. Texas is laughable - it ignores the most basic principles of Constitutional and statutory law - and blithely overturns recent Supreme Court precedent (i.e., it violates the principle of "stare decisis").

A second-year law student has a firmer grasp of Constitutional principles than Justice Kennedy - as displayed in this jaw-dropping example of legislating from the bench.

The concept that a majority of people in a sovereign state - through their legislature - are forbidden from passing laws outlawing what they deem to be deviant sexual behavior (where the Court admits no fundamental right is involved) is absurd. The Court rules that there is no rational basis for a law based on morality. This is insane. Most laws are based on the majority's judgments regarding morality.

Justice Scalia's dissent is entirely correct.

An excerpt:

* * *

I turn now to the ground on which the Court squarely rests its holding: the contention that there is no rational basis for the law here under attack. This proposition is so out of accord with our jurisprudenceñindeed, with the jurisprudence of any society we knowñthat it requires little discussion.

The Texas statute undeniably seeks to further the belief of its citizens that certain forms of sexual behavior are ìimmoral and unacceptable,î Bowers, supra, at 196ñthe same interest furthered by criminal laws against fornication, bigamy, adultery, adult incest, bestiality, and obscenity. Bowers held that this was a legitimate state interest. The Court today reaches the opposite conclusion. The Texas statute, it says, ìfurthers no legitimate state interest which can justify its intrusion into the personal and private life of the individual,î ante, at 18 (emphasis addded). The Court embraces instead Justice Stevensí declaration in his Bowers dissent, that ìthe fact that the governing majority in a State has traditionally viewed a particular practice as immoral is not a sufficient reason for upholding a law prohibiting the practice,î ante, at 17. This effectively decrees the end of all morals legislation. If, as the Court asserts, the promotion of majoritarian sexual morality is not even a legitimate state interest, none of the above-mentioned laws can survive rational-basis review.

* * *

I couldn't care less if the Texas legislature actually does vote to remove its anti-sodomy law from the books. They can do that. The judiciary cannot. This is Civics 101.

I can't understand the degree to which Justice O'Connor and Justice Kennedy have gone all squishy - they threw the law out the window to reach a feel-good result. And Justice O'Connor is a former state legislator, for Pete's sake! Insane.

George Will's column on the decision is absolutely right:

* * *

Today laws criminalizing homosexual sodomy are rare and rarely enforced. They should be repealed. In most states they have been, by democratic persuasion.

But "unconstitutional" is not a synonym for "unjust" or "unwise," and the Constitution is not a scythe that judges are free to wield to cut down all laws they would vote to repeal as legislators. Legislators can adjust laws to their communities' changing moral sensibilities without creating, as courts do, principles, such as the broadly sweeping privacy right, that sweep away more than communities intend to discard.

The question is not whether states are wise to criminalize this or that sex act outside of marriage. Rather, the question is: Once the court has said that some such acts are constitutional rights, by what principle are any of the myriad possible permutations of consensual adult sexual activities denied the same standing?

Once consent -- "choice" -- supplants marriage as the important interest served by cloaking sexual activities as constitutional rights, by what principle is any consensual adult sexual conduct not a protected right? Bigamy? Polygamy? Prostitution? Incest? Even -- if we assume animals can consent, or that their consent does not matter -- bestiality?

By what has been called "semantic infiltration," seemingly bland language stealthily permeates discourse with ideology. So it is with the now commonplace locution "sexual preferences."

If preferences are all that they are, if none are grounded in nature rather than mere conventions or appetites, then by what principle are they not all equal? And given that in a 1992 abortion ruling the privacy right was explained as "the right to physical autonomy," the question is not just whether there is a fundamental right to engage in sodomy. Why not the right to physical autonomy in using heroin?

* * *

And the Washington Post editorial page has it exactly wrong:

* * *

Law, the court has said in effect, is meant to regulate crime, not a majoritarian conception of sin.

* * *

This distinction, made by the majority in the Lawrence decision (and by the Washington Post editorial page) is a classic distinction without a difference.

Most laws, by definition, regulate "sin" - in the sense that they legislate morality. The concept that we can separate "crime" from "sin" is illusory at best, absurd and ridiculous at worst.

Every attempt to legislatively prohibit a "crime" is based on the majority's moral judgment that the subject conduct is immoral. Why else are such basic crimes as murder, rape, and theft illegal? Because, of course, the underlying conduct is immoral - and the majority of legislators in each state with a law on the subject agree that the conduct is immoral.

It's a mystery how the Supreme Court, the Washinton Post, or anyone else, can hope to pretend otherwise - as all future laws, too, will be based on the majority's sense of morality. This, in fact, is a pretty good definition of "law."

Does this mean if the Supreme Court rules against some of the 'goofy' laws that Vermont has passed, they, won't complain about 'THEIR' State's rights being violated?

You all don't seem to get it. The government can always choose to not legislate in an area. Then, so long as force or fraud is not employed, whatever conduct takes place between consenting adults is simply controlled by contracts and property rights.

By striking a sodomy law, no violation is committed against Federalism. Congress too will be barred from passing a sodomy law against homosexuals. BOTH levels of government are told to not legislate in that small zone of privacy. How the slippery slope comes into play is open for debate. But I am never impressed by the "sky is falling" debate, especially when the original ruling is right. Roe v Wade went further than this opinion.

And the Court did not legislate from the bench. It unlegislated. It returned the issue to the "no law" area. Telling Schools how to operate, how to draw their districts, that is legislating from the bench. Telling them they did unconstitutionally and to try again, that it is upholding the constitution. The current court, b/c it is basically conservative, takes the second approach (see the Georgia legislative district case of the same day). A liberal court would have drawn the lines for the State of Georgia. That would invade Federalism.

What the Court did in the sodomy case is not very dangerous. And it will not invade the State's rights to expand (eg, Vermont) or maintain the current definition of marriage. The States can always give more "rights" or choose to not legislate. All that the Court can/should do, and it should do it when appropriate, is strike laws that legislate in violation of the Constitution.

Lines do have to be drawn somewhere. My consitutional line is much different than my political line. But proclaiming the absurd as now plausible does not impress me. Conservatives are usually better suited at arguing logically and with reason. Many people here have posted in the sky is falling fashion above. It makes you, quite frankly, sound like liberals.

Nikita,
If stare decisis were so powerful, then Dred Scot would still be a controlling precedent.
The main part of the Lawrence decision was the Equal Protection clause. The Texas law criminalized behavior for a select group of people, but said nothing about the same behavior in everyone else.
It is akin to saying that only Caucasians may go to church, all others must pray in their homes, or face prosecution.
If it is legal for some adults, then it is legal for all.

Most laws do one of three things:

1. Raise taxes to fund government
2. Create and regulate bodies to carry out governement funtions
3. Regulate behavior and economic activity.

With respect to #3, most (though not all, see drug laws, minimum wage) of these regulations forbid one person from depriving another person of life, liberty or property by force or fraud. Nearly all conduct that would do any of the above is a sin (eg, murder, theft, lying). B/c each of these is a sin, that does not mean that all regulations of sin should be the government's job. That is the basic distinction in the case we are talking about. There was no deprivation of the rights of another involved. Saying we regulate "sin" all of the time doesn't answer the question. Sin alone doesn't make it subject to government regulation.

Laws don't regulate "sin." They don't even recognize the concept. "Sin" is defined by a particular religious tradition. Different faiths, different sins.
Laws regulate behavior that the government thinks they have a compelling interest in regulating. Like shooting people. Not because of "Thou shalt not murder", but because you may not deprive someone of life without due process. Murder isn't a "sin" to the law, it is the unlawful killing of a human being.

See the difference?

texans are without a doubt the dumbest people i have ever witnessed and i lived all over the states and in australia. if their brains ever caught up with their egos...they might have a chance. i mean houston was voted last in travel and leisure magazine as a place to live or visit...and a local houston station bragged about it...stoopid