Court Cases

Race, Gender, and Justice Federal Cases

Reynolds v. United States, 98 U.S. 145 (U.S. Supreme Court, 1878).: The court upheld a prosecution of a polygamist. The Court implicitly rejected a right to marry more than one spouse at a time.
Pace v. Alabama, 106 U.S. 583 (U.S. Supreme Court, 1883).: The court upheld a state law barring defferent-race marriage. the Court rejected the argument that the law's descrimination on the basis of race violated the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
Skinner v. Oklahoma, 316 U.S. 535 (U.S. Supreme Court, 1942).: The Court invalidated Oklahoma's law requiring sterilization of certain criminals (e.g., thieves) and not other (e.g., embezzlers) as a violation of the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
Poe v. Ullman, 367 U.S. 497 (U.S. Supreme Court, 1961).: The Court dismissed constitutional challenges to Connecticut's law prohibiting the sale and use of contraceptives. The Court found the controversy insufficiently "ripe" to adjudicate, but Justice Harlan wrote an influential dissent that argued that the law violated the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Justice Harlan's approach was recognized as the classic articulation of the "right to privacy" in Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pensylvania v. Casey, 112 S. Ct. 2791 (U.S. Supreme Court, 1992) (Jount Opinion).
McLaughlin v. Florida, 379 U.S. 184 (U.S. Supreme Court, 1964).: The Court invalidated a law barring different-race couples from cohabitating; the law violated the equal protection clause. The decision implicitly overruled Pace v. Alabama.
Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 (U.S. Supreme Court, 1965).: The Court invalidated Connecticut's anticontraception law as a violation of a "right to privacy" found in the "penumbras" of the Bill of Rights. The right to privacy was to prove robust; the penumbral analysis was not.
Loving v. Virginia, 388 U.S. 1 (U.S. Supreme Court, 1967).: The Court invalidated Virginia's prohibition of different-race marriage as a violation of both the equal protection and due process clauses. The decision explicitly overruled Pace v. Alabama. In defense of its antimiscegenation law, Virginia cited the disapproval of different-race marriage by religious and moral traditions, an argument the Court rejected. This decision initiated the "right to marry" line of cases.
Craig v. Boren, 429 U.S. 190 (U.S. Supreme Court, 1976).: The Court invalidated a state law setting different age requirements for males and females purchasing low-alcohol beer. Notwhithstanding the failure of the federal Equal Rights Amendment to be ratified, the Court held that classifications based on sex should be subjected to heightened judicial scrutiny under the auspices of the equal protection clause.
Zablocki v. Redhail, 434 U.S. 374 (U.S. Supreme Court, 1978).: The Court invalidated Wisconsin's bar to remarriage when one partner has unpaid support obligations from a previous marriage. Emphasizing the state's interference with Loving's right to marry, the Court held that the law violated the equal protection clause.
Adams v. Howerton, 486 F. Supp. 1119 (U.S. District Court for the Central District of California, 1980), affirmed on other grounds, 673 F.2d 1036 (U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, 1982).: Relying on biblical tradition, the court refused to recognize a same-sex marriage under either state or federal law.
Bowers v. Hardwick, 478 U.S. 186 (U.S. Supreme Court, 1986).: The Court held that Georgia's sodomy law did not violate the right to privacy, at least with respect to "homosexual sodomy."
Turner v. Safley, 482 U.S. 78 (U.S. Supreme Court, 1987).: The Court invalidated Missouri's almost complete bar to marriage by prison inmates. Although the Court deferred to state rules regulating prisoners, it held that denial of the right to marry requres more rigorous justification because the unitive and legal features of marriage are so fundamental in our polity.
Watkins v. United States, 847 F.2d 1329 (U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, 1988), affirmed on narrower grounds, 875 F.2d 699 (U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, sitting en banc, 1989).: The court invalidated the discharge of a gay serviceman as a violation of the equal protection clause. The opinion of the panel is the most thorough justification for subjecting classification based on sexual orientation to heightened scrutiny, similar to the scrutiny requred for classification based on sex.
Romer v. Evans, 116 S.Ct. 1620 (U.S. Supreme Court, 1996): The court invalidated an amendment to Colorado's constitution which would have repealed (and prevented future enactment of) all state, municipal and local ordinances that prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. Referring to Plessy, Justice Kennedy spoke for a 6-3 majority when he said that Colorado's Amendment 2 failed to meet even a rational basis test and that "a State cannot so deem a class of persons a stranger to its laws."

Created 10/9/97
Michael Suh