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COLLEGIAN 100 YEARS
April 1887-April 1987
U.S. Constitution does not protect
private sexual conduct, court rules
By RICHARD CARELLI
Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON, D.C. The Supreme Court, upholding
a Georgia sodomy law by a 5-4 vote, ruled yesterday that
consenting adults have no constitutional right to private
homosexual conduct.
The ruling was limited to “consensual homosexual
sodomy.” But nothing in its sweeping language cast doubt
on the constitutionality of state laws that also make
heterosexual sodomy a crime, even when performed by
married couples.
“The proposition that any kind of private sexual con
duct between consenting adults is constitutionally insu
lated from state proscription is unsupportable,” Justice
Byron R. White wrote for the court.
The Georgia law, which White said is similar to those in
half the states, defines sodomy as “any sexual act
involving the sex organs of one person and the mouth or
anus of another.”
In its decision, the court refused to recognize private
homosexual conduct as a “fundamental right” deserving
of the Constitution’s fullest protection.
The court ruled previously that decisions to marry,
have children, practice birth control or have an abortion
are such fundamental rights.
“We think it evident that none of the rights announced
in those cases bear any resemblance to the claimed
constitutional right of homosexuals to engage in acts of
sodomy,” White said.
The Georgia law was challenged by Michael Hardwick,
a gay Atlanta bartender who was arrested in 1982 for
allegedly committing sodomy in his home. He never has
been prosecuted under the law, which carries a maxi
mum penalty of 20 years in prison.
The arresting officer had gone to Hardwick’s home to
Gays outraged over sodomy law
By The Associated Press
Leaders of gay rights groups said
yesterday they feared the U.S. Su
preme Court’s decision that consent
ing adults have no constitutional right
to private homosexual conduct would
encourage states to take action
against homosexual activity.
Others pledged to continue cam
paigning for repeal of state sodomy
laws and said the decision would
prompt increased gay rights activity.
“Over the past 20 years, there has
been a process of decriminalizing
sodomy in about half the states,” said
Eric Rofes, executive director of the
Gay and Lesbian Center in West
Hollywood, Calif. “This decision is an
outrageous violation of personal dig
nity. It says people don’t have a right
to do what they want in their own
bedroom, whether they are two men,
a man and a woman or two women.”
“I think this will promote a witch
hunt” against homosexuals, said Dan
DeLeo, co-publisher of Gay Chicago,
a weekly newspaper. “I wouldn’t be
surprised if other states now tried to
enact such laws.”
He called the decision “devastat
ing. Despite the conservative nature
of the court, I find it really difficult to
believe.”
The high court, ruling 5-4, upheld a
Georgia law which defined sodomy as
Highest starting salaries
go to petroleum engineers
BETHLEHEM (AP) Despite plummet
ing oil prices, petroleum engineers topped a
survey of 1986 college graduates with both
an average starting salary offer of $33,144
and a 6.9 percent gain since last summer.
Most disciplines in the non-profit College
Placement Council’s March survey record
ed slight increases of 1 percent to 3 percent
since the agency’s year-end report in July,
said Judith O’Flynn Kayser, manager of
statistical services.
“It should be a better job market for the
class of ’B6 than it was for the class of ’85,”
Kayser said
“The fact that they did so exceptionally
well was a bit of a surprise in light of what’s
happened to oil prices and to the oil indus
try,” said Kayser.
She said there is a lag time between
economic movement and change in employ
ment and that petroleum engineers may
feel the effects of the oil-industry turmoil at
the end of the year.
Kayser attributed the gain to a smaller
supply of petroleum engineering graduates,
the result of a drop in enrollment in the field
during the recession four years ago.
tuesday
weather
This afternoon, mostly cloudy and cool with a chance of scattered showers. High 72.
Tonight, cloudy with a continued risk of showers. Low 56. Tomorrow, more clouds with
showers or thundershowers possible. High 75 Heidi Sonen
the
daily
issue a warrant in another case and was told he could find
him in his bedroom.
Hardwick sued Georgia officials in 1983, seeking to have
the law declared unconstitutional. He had won in the 11th
U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, but that ruling was re
versed yesterday.
“Plainly enough, otherwise illegal conduct is not al
ways immunized whenever it occurs in the home,” White
said. “It would be difficult. . .to limit the claimed right of
homosexual conduct while leaving exposed to prosecution
adultery, incest and other sexual crimes even though they
are committed in the home.”
The court swept aside arguments that the Georgia law
has no rational basis without explicitly ruling that it is
rational.
“Law is constantly based on notions of morality,”
White said, “and if all laws representing essentially
moral choices are to be invalidated.. .the courts will be
very busy indeed.”
White was joined by Chief Justice Warren E. Burger
and Justices Lewis F. Powell, William H. Rehnquist and
Sandra Day O’Connor.
Powell wrote separately that the heavy penalty at
tached to violations of the state’s sodomy law could
represent unconstitutional “cruel and unusual punish
ment” because it is the same punishment meted out to
convicted arsonists and robbers.
Justices Harry A. Blackmun, William J. Brennan,
Thurgood Marshall and John Paul Stevens dissented.
Writing for the four, Blackmun called the decision
“revolting.”
“This case is about the most comprehensive of rights
and the right most valued by civilized men, namely the
right to be let alone,” he said.
Blackmun said he saw no justification for “invading the
houses, hearts and minds of citizens who choose to live
their lives differently.”
“any sexual act involving the sex
organs of one person and the mouth
or anus of another.” The court over
turned an appeals court ruling that
the law infringed on fundamental
constitutional rights.
“We’re just stunned that the Su
preme Court of the United States
would say that this kind of intrusion
by the government is constitutional.
It plainly is not,” said Richard Swan
son, administrator of the Atlanta Gay
Center.
Georgia Attorney General Michael
Bowers, whose office defended the
sodomy law, praised the decision as
“tremendously far-reaching.”
But an Atlanta police official said
the ruling will not cause a mass
invasion of privacy.
“If we see it, we’re going to make
the case” for prosecution, said Maj.
J.E. Oliver. “Nobody is going to be
going into people’s homes looking for
sodomy.”
Ron Najman, spokesman for the
National Gay and Lesbian Task
Force in New York, predicted the
decision “will energize the gay rights
movement in a way that will knock
people’s socks off. We have just be
gun to fight.”
“I urge everyone to support one
another to come out. Our real victory
won’t be in the courts but in our
homes and workplaces,” said Morris
Chemical engineers, according to the
survey, saw a drop in the number of report
ed offers from last year, but the average
offer rose 3.8 percent to $29,508. Offers for
electrical engineers averaged $27,804, up 1.5
percent.
Computer science rose 4.8 percent, to $26,-
172, while accounting, at $21,204 per year,
reported a 4.2 percent gain and was one of
the few disciplines with the same number of
offers as a year ago.
Marketing and distribution rose 2.5 per
cent to $19,044. Offers for business admins
tration majors fell short in number and
value, slipping to $19,536 from $19,632.
Offers for social science majors dropped
5.5 percent to $17,520. Humanities majors
averaged $17,568, a 0.2 percent increase.
“That doesn’t mean it’s gloom and doom
for these students. It’s just that most of
these students don’t get their offers until
they graduate,” Kayser said.
The College Placement Council is a na
tional association for job planning, place
ment and recruitment officers. The survey
is based on salary offers, not acceptances.
Collegian
Right, a member of the Los Angeles
County Human Rights Commission
and gay-rights activist.
Said Roberta Achtenberg, ah attor
ney with the Lesbian Rights Founda
tion in San Francisco, “It’s not going
to be the end of the gay rights
movement in the least. It will make
all groups work harder on the legal
front.”
In Boise, Idaho, the Rev. Ed Sher
riff of the Metropolitan Community
Church, which ministers to the area’s
gay population, estimated at 5,000 to
10,000, said he was disappointed by
the decision but pleased that the court
was so divided.
He thinks it will be difficult to
enforce morals laws.
“Who’s going into your bedroom to
see what you’re doing? I don’t think
our government can legislate morals
or what we’re doing or not doing,”
Sherriff said. “The court’s getting its
nose into areas where it doesn’t be
long.”
“Historically, the federal courts
were a place to protect your rights. It
bodes badly for people in other
groups,” warned Abby Rubenfeld of
New York, legal director of the
Lambda Legal Defense and Educa
tion Fund, which includes a network
of 150 cooperating attorneys around
the country.
U.S. might increase aid to black nations
By HENRY GOTTLIEB
Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON, D.C. Secretary of State
George P. Shultz said yesterday that a U.S.
review of its South Africa policy, could include
a search for new ways to assist black nations
in the region.
He also asserted that congressional cuts in
the Reagan administration’s $22.3 billion
foreign policy budget request could harm
U.S. efforts to improve the South Africa
situation.
Shultz, returning home after a 10-day trip
to Asia, told reporters on his flight from Palo
Alto, Calif., to Washington that the adminis
tration is aiming to complete the study “two
thirds of the way through July” and is likely
to make the findings public in congressional
testimony.
White House spokesman Larry Speakes
said President Reagan, who also returned to
Washington yesterday at the end of a five-day
vacation at his California ranch, will get the
results of the review within the next several
weeks.
Shultz said that an important element of
U.S. policy could be to help several black
states that border South Africa which depend
economically on their powerful white-ruled
neighbor. Among the countries in this region
are Botswana, Zambia and Mozambique.
In recent criticism of congressional moves
to impose tough economic sanctions on South
Africa, Shultz has said that such measures
would hurt the neighboring countries.
In a challenge to Congress, Shultz said
yesterday: “Do they plan to do anything to
help Botswana or just let them decline?
“I would think if you are as concerned
about the problem as those who want to rip
South Africa seem to think they are, you
would want to address yourself to the prob
lems of southern Africa generally,” he said.
Though he declined to outline what the
administration’s review might lead to, the
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Cloud scraper
A Collegian photographer presents a new angle on a pulley and crane being used to build the new indoor football
training facility. The fieldhouse will be located next to the Greenberg Indoor Sports Complex.
implication was that an element could be
increased financial assistance to Botswana
and perhaps its black neighbors.
“Those who feel the way to bring about
change in South Africa is to bring the South
African economy down as much as they can,
must realize that in doing so they bring down
the economies of the surrounding states,
which depend on South Africa,” Shultz said.
A senior administration official, who has
been involved in the high-level study, said
over the weekend that the review is geared
toward opening new avenues of communica
tion to both black and white communities in
South Africa in order to further a dialogue.
He said the administration has had “low
level” contacts outside of South Africa with
members of the outlawed African National
Congress, the coalition of black activists
seeking an end to white minority rule in South
Africa.
The Reagan aide ruled out the possibility
Reagan would impose any economic sanc
tions as a result of the review or that any
specific action was imminent.
“We are opposed to apartheid. . . .We are
also opposed to sanctions,” the official said.
Shultz, who has for months been criticizing
Congress for cutting his budget, for the first
time linked expenditure cuts to the South
African situation.
“I suppose if people get around to examin
ing what it really means to put the pressure
on South Africa in terms of what you do for
Botswana, that costs money,” he said. “If
you’re not willing to put money up, you don’t
have as much to say.”
The administration’s request for $22.3 bil
lion in this year’s budget for foreign aid and
other State Department programs was cut to
$17.8 billion in the Senate and $l7 billion in the
House. A $17.4 billion compromise was
reached.
Tuesday, July 1,1986
Vol. 87, No. 12 10 pages University Park, Pa. 16802
Published by students of The Pennsylvania State University
©1986 Collegian Inc.
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WENN
‘Those who feel the way to
bring about change in
South Africa is to bring the
South African economy
down as much as they can,
must realize that in doing
so they bring down the
economies of the
surrounding states, which
depend on South Africa.’
“I think it’s a budding catastrophe if you
cut the foreign policy down to the extent in
the congressional budget resolution,” he
said.
Though Congress has shown “sympathy to
the adminstation’s budget concerns,” Shultz
said, “we haven’t gotten anywhere in terms
of what really counts, namely the money.”
He said he understood the need for econ
omy in light of huge federal budget deficits,
but “totally pulling the rug out from under it
(foreign policy) is something different.”
Under the House sanctions bill passed two
weeks ago, most U.S. economic activity with
South Africa would cease six months after
enactment of the legislation.
While Shultz repeated his disdain for the
bill, he repeated his view that the situation in
South Africa was deteriorating.
“There is an increased level of violence,”
he said. “We see an interplay of efforts to
move substantially away from apartheid,”
but he called it “a kind of two steps forward,
one and three-quarters steps backward
play.”
Collegian Photo / Ylannos Nlcolaldes
George P. Shultz,
secretary of state