Talk:Bowers v. Hardwick

Cause of Arrest

I'm taking a Law class and my professor contends that Bowers was arrested due to unpaid parking tickets, not due to public drunkenness. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sklausner (talk • contribs) 02:30, 16 March 2006

I've just read in Peter Irons "The Courage of Their Convictions" it was failure to appear in court for drinking in public.CLaplante —Preceding undated comment added 01:34, 19 April 2006

-- I was also curious about the cause of arrest issue. The Supreme Court case itself says nothing on the issue. I was hoping to get to the bottom of it, but the smell of bias in the initial fact pattern has me questioning this article's portrayal. While I have no knowledge one way or the other, at the very least it'd be nice to see a cite to support the fact pattern set forth in the article. Apc7a (talk) 18:34, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

I would like to see some cites to the opening facts around the officer being at the house.Shark15994 (talk) 05:29, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

Some Answers to the Above, Then "Aftermath" Section Problems

Suggested reading is the USSC cases from 1986. There is nothing like studying the opinions first hand. You will find all answers there. I'd like to post what I recall when I read this case in full, to see if it helps. Excuse my quick-and-easy layman terminology. The deputy was stated in the opinion to have been allowed entry into Hardwick's apartment by the landlady. It was for the purpose of serving papers. This is the time when said deputy caught Hardwick in flagrante delicto as it were.

As to the Aftermath section, I have to say it is very badly and unprofessionally written. This case was decided purely (by the majority) on the basis of homophobia--and the majority opinion states this clearly. There was no aftermath per se other than the people saying the USSC had declared homosexuals exempt from Constitutional protection of any kind. See Rhenquist's opinion for language even worse than the aftermath section. As for true aftermath, well, the ruling opened every homphobic door there was in this nation. Other enlightened nations laughed at us.75.21.102.18 (talk) 10:37, 23 May 2010 (UTC)

CLaplante, do you have a citation for that? The current citation for that sentence does not pan out, so I'm removing it. Helixer (hábleme) 15:40, 28 February 2013 (UTC)

I've added some additional details regarding Hardwick's arrest, which are more fully described in the book: Nussbaum, Martha C. (2010) "From Disgust to Humanity: Sexual Orientation and Constitutional Law" Oxford University Press, isbn=9780195305319, in a chapter entitled "Bowers v. Hardwick: Intrusion and Obtuseness". It's quite a read, especially for an academic book, and the circumstances are substantially more egregious than what is summarized in this Wikipedia article (for example, Hardwick was beaten-up by three men outside his home, in the days after the resolution of his public-drinking citation but before his arrest for sodomy). Note that Nussbaum's account is quite consistent with those described in the other two books cited in this section -- as well as with what was described in earlier editions of this article circa 2010. However, the narrative I just modified was less consistent with these several secondary sources, which is why I investigated the matter more thoroughly to make appropriate edits. Theophilus reed 7 August 2018

overturn

I'm going to revert [1] because I believe that the overturn of this ruling is a central aspect of a contemporary neutral discussion of it, and therefore per WP:MOSBEGIN, it should be mentioned in the first paragraph. To avoid edit warring I won't revert again if it's re-removed, without first seeking further discussion here. But if someone decides to remove the info again, they should explain their reasoning. 67.119.3.105 (talk) 21:46, 28 November 2012 (UTC)

Oh I see now, the version I reverted said "later overturned", and I mis-read the diff. I still prefer my version but the info is at least present in both. A phrasing that just said "overturned in 2003" would IMHO be fine if there's a way to make it flow. Sticking it into the previous existing wording just seems a bit awkward, so I've left in the added sentence explicitly mentioning Lawrence. 67.119.3.105 (talk) 23:11, 28 November 2012 (UTC)

The details (Lawrence and 2003) are already mentioned later in the entry's summary and should not be mentioned twice in what is, after all, a summary of the body of the entry. And where the detail is provided later, there is much more detail, like 40+ words. Nor should the Lawrence decision be wikilinked twice. The fact that the decision was overturned is significant, I agree, and a heads-up to the reader is in order in the lede, but the detail is not significant at that point. I took your suggestion on phrasing. Bmclaughlin9 (talk) 23:42, 28 November 2012 (UTC)

Powell "incapacitated"?

This article claims that "an incapacitated Lewis Powell cast the deciding vote" in this case. That certainly doesn't sound like it's true the way our article currently reads. Who's wrong? --BDD (talk) 02:36, 20 February 2016 (UTC)

John and Mary Doe

"A heterosexual married couple was initially named in the suit as plaintiffs John and Mary Doe,[citation needed] alleging that they wished to engage in sodomy[citation needed] but were prevented from doing so by the Georgia anti-sodomy law.[citation needed] However, they failed to obtain standing[citation needed] and were dropped from the suit.[citation needed]"

If there is literally no proof for this information available, why is it still on the page? Does anyone have any source for this at all? 76.99.201.202 (talk) 18:11, 2 April 2017 (UTC)

@76.99.201.202: It's in the opinion of the court, I have added a citation to the claim. You can read it yourself over on Cornell's website, just CTRL+F search for "Mary Doe" and it shows up. Respectfully, InsaneHacker (💬) 09:03, 24 August 2017 (UTC)

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Bowers' standing as "among the worst rulings ever"

@KlayCax you reverted my changes to the lede which reworded a sentence which claimed Bowers to be among the worst rulings ever penned by the Supreme Court, particularly for its perceived poor legal reasoning and vitriolic rhetoric against homosexual activity. The sentence asserts the key positions that it was (1) among the worst rulings ever penned and (2) that this is primarily because of its perceived poor legal reasoning and vitriolic rhetoric against homosexual activity.

I don't think the sources provided ( [1] [2] [3] [4] ) adequately back up either claims; for one, none of the sources back up the first (1) claim. The FindLaw source is no better than an opinion piece, and it makes no reference to any scholarly consensus or opinion regarding Bowers after it was overruled—it is practically pure opinion. The ABA piece makes two lists: one which considers the worst opinions from a conservative perspective, and another from a liberal perspective. Bowers was listed only in the liberal list, and the article states simply that it "was not forgotten" by liberals and nothing else.

The TIME piece did survey 34 scholars on the subject of the worst Supreme Court cases, but they limited this list to only the worst cases Since 1960. The writer, Andrea Sachs, explicitly mentioned that this list was an "admittedly unscientific survey". Of the 34 scholars surveyed, only three—Kathryn Abrams, Ashutosh Bhagwat, and Jamal Greene—listed Bowers, and TIME did not include the case among its summary of cases most negatively received by the professors listed.

In my opinion, the only source which holds even somewhat serious weight to the claim is the one from the Encyclopædia Britannica, but, once again, it says only that scholars overwhelmingly sided with the dissenters—a statement which does not back up the rather large assertion that Bowers was one of the Supreme Court's worst rulings ever.

I think it would be better to stick to Britannica's claim that scholars generally sided with the dissenters, and as such only that claim should be included in the lede. I also don't think the claim that Even most "conservative" judges wouldn't not defend the tenets of Bowers v. Hardwick anymore is solid either. For example, if you look at the dissent in Lawrence v. Texas, two conservative giants—Scalia and Thomas—moved to defend the merits of Bowers, tenets included. Within his dissent, Scalia writes that the Court relied on the central holding in Bowers for a couple of other cases (i.e. Barnes v. Glen Theatre, Inc.) and bemoaned, "What a massive disruption of the current social order, therefore, the overruling of Bowers entails." GuardianH (talk) 23:19, 4 March 2023 (UTC)