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Bowers v. Hardwick Majority Opinion The purpose of this rese

The purpose of this research is to examine the majority opinion in Bowers v. Hardwick. The plan of the research will be to set forth an opposing answer to the opinion by addressing the main points relevant to the issue of the right to privacy raised by the case, making reference not only to the Constitution and to other decisions by the Supreme Court, but to the various opinions written by all justices taking part in the decision.

In a 5 to 4 vote, the Supreme Court in 1986 decided that mutually consensual homosexual conduct, specifically the act of sodomy, committed in the privacy of a home, could Constitutionally be prohibited by the state of Georgia. The majority position was taken in opposition to a petition on the part of a man charged with sodomy to the effect that "the Federal Constitution confers a fundamental right upon homosexuals to engage in sodomy." Though the specific charges originally brought by Georgia were dropped, the suit was prosecuted to the Supreme Court on the view that the case raised issues of individual privacy and the limits of state power to enforce statutes designed to regulate consensual sexual behavior. White's majority opinion was based on cases argued on grounds of moral and statutory tradition, a stated reluctance on the part of the federal judiciary to actively interfere with state law duly enacted pursuant to the will of a majority of the people, a reluctance to enlarge the scope and definition of due process as defined in the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments on such an idiosyncratic issue as consensual homosexual sodomy. In a concurring opinion, Warren Burger emphasized the traditional moral proscriptions against homosexual sodomy, which had been referred to by various legal and historical authorities. In his concurring opinion, Lewis Powell cited the fact that the petitioner had not been prosecuted by Georgia law on one hand, and had not therefore been subject to cruel and unusual punishment on ...

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Bowers v. Hardwick Majority Opinion The purpose of this rese. (1969, December 31). In LotsofEssays.com. Retrieved 08:15, March 28, 2024, from https://www.lotsofessays.com/viewpaper/1705342.html