Supreme Court Case: Bowers V. Hardwick

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In 1986, the U.S. supreme court ruled to uphold the constitutionality of a Georgia sodomy law criminalizing anal and oral sex in private between consenting adults, marking a legal precedent allowing individual states to freely enforce sodomy statutes of their own. This supreme court case, Bowers v. Hardwick, began when Michael Hardwick was found by police having oral sex with another man when they entered his home. Hardwick was charged with sodomy, a felony in Georgia. A preliminary hearing was held with Hardwick, as a self-described practicing homosexual, asserting that the anti-sodomy statute placed him in imminent danger of arrest. He filed suit in Federal District Court, arguing the statute was unconstitutional. The District Court ruled