Lawrence v. Texas

The Christian Science Monitor has a good summary of the issues at stake in Lawrence v. Texas, the SC's new sodomy case being heard this week. My conlaw professor and I are in agreement that the ruling will almost certainly overturn Bowers v. Hardwick, but even then the question remains how far the court will go. As the story points out, the court really has three options:

They can uphold the Texas law, stating that it is up to elected lawmakers to grapple with such difficult social issues.

Second, they could declare that the law violates equal-protection principles by treating gays differently. Such a ruling would invalidate homosexual-conduct laws in four states, but might leave intact similar, but broader, laws in the nine other states.

Finally, the court could issue a much broader ruling that American bedrooms are off limits to state scrutiny because they are protected by fundamental concepts of liberty and privacy that earlier courts have identified in the Constitution. Such a ruling would invalidate all 13 homosexual-conduct laws nationwide, and would overturn a 1986 court precedent upholding Georgia's sodomy law.

Should be a very interesting decision.