POLICING MORALITY 7.6 Forensic Law – November 20, 2013

Objectives: SWBAT  Identify the moral basis of laws  Debate the idea of legislating morality

Is this obscene?

What is Morality?  Are morals absolute?  How do morals change?  Fundamental question of right and wrong?  “You can’t legislate morality.”

Is morality a legitimate basis?  Every state has a certain police power  Fundamental principle of a state power  Police public health, safety, welfare, and morality  Codified by the SCOTUS Boston Beer Co v MA (1887) “Whatever the differences of opinion that may exist…[police power] does extend to protecting morality”

Religious influences  Religion is the greatest moral force in human society  In the US religious dogma often conflicts with societal opinion  The US is supposed to be separate from any religion  Yet biblical law is still essentially enforced  How?!  A: it has been understood that most biblical law does serve a secular purpose

Police Power and Social Consensus  Given: Laws prohibit behavior that society agrees is bad (read: immoral)  Prohibition (booze, drugs, etc.)  What happens when society changes?  Gambling  Gay marriage  Drug use  Polygamy

The Right to Privacy  Griswald v CT (1965)  Roe v Wade (1973)  Practically about contraception and abortion  Ostensibly about privacy and morality  Both challenged laws that were based on the perceived societal morals  Both argued that actions were private decisions that the state had no jurisdiction

Consensual Sexual contact  Morality has changed  Laws banning incest, and bigamy (polygamy) largely exist today  Laws against adultery are still on the books, but rarely tried  Laws against seduction and sodomy have largely died off

Changing Morals: Sodomy  Sodomy  Refers to the biblical city of Sodom  “crimes against nature”  “crimes not fit to be named”  Law took it to be any form of sexual contact that was outside the “traditional” heterosexual act  Both hetero and homosexual relations

Changing Morals  Today these laws are largely extinct  In practice these laws were largely used to prosecute homosexual populations  Lawrence v Texas (2003)  The government can not legislate consensual acts between adults  Being gay is no longer a crime in many states