Brief Amicus Curiae, Bowers v. Hardwick

Introduction

Amici curiae Lesbian Rights Project et al. contend that the right of privacy, as derived from the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights, readily and reasonably includes the right of an adult person of whatever sexual orientation (to wit., whether heterosexual, bisexual, gay or lesbian) to choose to engage in physically private, consenting, non-violent sexual activities with another adult person. Amici believe that the privacy decisions of this Court, from the earliest to the most recent, support the position that it is within the fundamental rights of the individual person to make such intimate personal choices as are not only proscribed but criminalized by the “anti-sodomy” law of the State of Georgia. Amici for respondents assert that the need for love is natural, and that the determination to express and receive love of a sexual nature by engaging in sexual activities with another adult of the same gender is one possible type of behavior within the range of medical and psychological normalcy.

Suggested Reading

Radical, humanistic, and freedom-loving perspectives can and do become majoritarian, as dissenting opinions do, by consistent and tireless articulation, argumentation and struggle, and by refusal to retreat.

 State Laws Argued in Federal Court Shahar v. Bowers, 114 F.3d 1097 (11th Cir. 1997):  The Plaintiff, Ms. Robin Shahar has received a job offer from the Georgia Attorney General’s office.  When the Attorney General learned of Ms. Shahar plans