Privacy+Cases

=Privacy cases: //The phrase "right to privacy" isn't anywhere in the Constitution or the Bill of Rights, yet Court decisions have established it// =

//Griswold v Connecticut (Melissa)//
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 * // Griswold was an Executive Director of the Planned Parenthood League of Connecticut. //
 * // In this case Griswold and another employee of Planned Parenthood had given some information, instruction, and other medical advice to a married couple that was concerned with birth control. Griswold and her colleague had been convicted under the Connecticut law which "criminalized" them from the provision of counseling and treatment, to married couples. //
 * // The decision had been seven votes for Griswold and two votes for against. //
 * There is nothing in the Constitution that protects the right to privacy, but with this case it had reinforced individual's liberties and protection from the government being too powerful.

//Hardwick v Georgia (Melissa)//

 * Michael Hardwick had been convicted of sodomy with an adult of the same gender. And Michael Hardwick had wanted the law that criminalized sodomy to be ruled as unconstitutional under the fourteenth amendment.
 * The decisions had been five votes for Hardwick and four votes for against. The court had declared that sodomy is unconstitutional, and Justice Byron White had had declared that sodomy was not in the Constitution and “deeply routed” into the Nation.
 * This case’s impact on individual’s civil liberties and rights were that it had limited the liberties protected to men and women under the Equal Rights Act.

//Lawrence v Texas (Stephanie)//

 * Houston police entered John Lawrence's apartment and saw him and another adult man, Tyron Garner, engaging in a private, consensual sexual act, claiming that they were responding to a reported weapons disturbance in a private residence.
 * Lawrence and Garner were arrested and convicted of deviate sexual intercourse in violation of a Texas statute forbidding two persons of the same sex to engage in certain intimate sexual conduct
 * Result: State Court of Appeals held that the statute was not unconstitutional under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment

//Roe v Wade (Justin)//

 * //Roe, a Texas resident, wished to terminate her pregnancy by abortion. Texas only permits abortion if it is used to save a woman's life. The question of this case was whether the Constitution embraced a woman's right to terminate her pregnancy with an abortion.//
 * //The Court ruled 7-2 in favor of Roe and her right to an abortion that fell under the right to privacy provided by the 14th Amendment.//
 * //This decision gave a woman total autonomy over the pregnancy during the first trimester and defined different levels of state interest for the second and third trimesters.//

//Romer v Evans (Stephanie)//

 * First case to deal with lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender rights in the United States since a previous case in 1986 when the Court ruled that a law criminalizing homosexual sex was constitutional.
 * Colorado voters adopted Amendment two to their State Constitution, preventing the government from adopting measures that would protect homosexuals from discrimination. The state trial court enjoined enforcement of the act.
 * Evans argued that Amendment two did nothing more than deny homosexuals special rights.
 * In a 6-to-3 decision, the Court held that Amendment 2 of the Colorado State Constitution violated the equal protection clause. Amendment 2 singled out homosexual and bisexual persons, imposing on them a broad disability by denying them the right to seek and receive specific legal protection from discrimination.

//Webster v Reproductive Health Services (Justin)//

 * //Missouri enacted legislation that placed restrictions on abortions. They claimed that life begins at conception and the restrictions stated that abortions were not to be given unless to save a woman's life, counseling and encouragement to abort was prohibited, and physicians are suppose to conduct viability tests on the mother in her twentieth week of pregnancy. The question was if these restrictions infringed upon the right of privacy in the 14th Amendment.//
 * //The Court voted 5-4 in favor of Webster. The Court held that none of the challenged provisions were unconstitutional.//
 * //The Court held that the preamble had not been applied in any concrete manner for the purposes of restricting abortions, and thus did not present a constitutional question. Second, the Court held that the Due Process Clause did not require states to enter into the business of abortion, and did not create an affirmative right to governmental aid in the pursuit of constitutional rights. Third, the Court found that no case or controversy existed in relation to the counseling provisions of the law. Finally, the Court upheld the viability testing requirements, arguing that the State's interest in protecting potential life could come into existence before the point of viability //