U.S. adults' support for overturning Lawrence v. Texas 2022

In June 2022, 21 percent of polled U.S. adults were in favor of overturning the United States Supreme Court case that protects the right of individuals to engage in same-sex activity.

Background

Lawrence v. Texas was a 2003 Supreme Court Case which ruled that criminal punishment for those who commit sodomy are unconstitutional. The case came before the court after John Geddes Lawrence Jr. was arrested alongside Tyron Garner in Harris County, Texas in 1998. The two men were found by Sheriff’s deputies engaging in sexual intercourse and were charged with a misdemeanor under Texas’ anti-sodomy law. After multiple appeals, the case made its way to the Supreme Court. The Texas sodomy law was struck down in a 6-3 decision, invalidating sodomy laws in 13 other states, and making same-sex sexual activity legal across the entirety of the U.S. and its territories. The three dissenting Justices were Antonin Scalia, Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, and Clarence Thomas. The six Justices in the majority entrenched its ruling in the same right to privacy granted by the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. This is the same legal principle that upheld other cases such as Roe v. Wade, Griswold v. Connecticut, and Obergefell v. Hodges.

A change of tone

Despite praise for the ruling from LGBT+ rights activists, the Lawrence ruling, and others may yet face challenges. In response to the June 2022 ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization - the decision that overturned Roe v. Wade - Justice Clarence Thomas wrote that the Court should reconsider all of the its substantive due process precedents, including Griswold, Lawrence, and Obergefell, and that the Court has a duty to ‘correct the error’ established in those precedents. This ruling as well as decisions on gun rights and the Environmental Protection Agency has led to strong feelings of disapproval towards the Court from the American public.