PRESTOPUNDIT -- "An intense brain-buzz, guaranteed" (2blowhards)

California Insider sees the Supreme Court's Texas decision as a victory for liberty, rather than an attack on liberal constitutionalism and the rule of law. Worth quoting at length:

The Supreme Court has just overturned the Texas law banning sodomy, and certain folks already are contending that this is somehow an example of legislating from the bench. �Regulating homosexual conduct�is the right of the people, to be exercised through the legislative, rather than the judicial, branches of government,� says Mathew Staver, President and General Counsel of Liberty Counsel. Perhaps this strangely named group needs to look up the definition of liberty. Regulating homosexual conduct is the right of the people, alright, to be exercised by the people in the privacy of their own homes � not by any branch of the government, legislative, judicial or executive. The court here isn�t regulating conduct. It�s preserving the right of free people to act as they please as long as their behavior is consensual and does not harm others. The court is not creating a right to sodomy; it�s denying the right of government to interfere in the private lives of free citizens. Big difference.

The more I see of this decision, the more it becomes apparent that it's a huge victory for liberty and should be celebrated by all opponents of an intrusive government, no matter their beliefs about homosexuality. The point is that three people, making a majority, ought not legislate what two others can do in the privacy of their own home. Would that this doctrine not stop at gay sex but be extended to all human conduct.

Key quote from Kennedy opinion:

"This, as a general rule, should counsel against attempts by the State, or a court, to define the meaning of the relationship or to set its boundaries absent injury to a person or abuse of an institution the law protects. It suffices for us to acknowledge that adults may choose to enter upon this relationship in the confines of their homes and their own private lives and still retain their dignity as free persons. When sexuality finds overt expression in intimate conduct with another person, the conduct can be but one element in a personal bond that is more enduring. The liberty protected by the Constitution allows homosexual persons the right to make this choice."

And Scalia, though dissenting, drives home the point:

"This effectively decrees the end of all morals legislation."

We can only hope that he is correct.

Well, I'm all for getting rid of the prostitution laws, but I don't want to get rid of the laws against child molestation -- and I don't want nine old people deciding the issue, especially when they haven't been elected dog catcher by the people.