Taking Lawrence together with Grutter, it is my sense that the Court--at least in these two cases--seems to be concerned far less with logic, precedent, and doctrinal consistency, than with ad hoc constitutional policymaking, informed explicitly or implicitly by the evolving values of American society (or at least the evolving values of American elites). I offer this observation neither as praise or condemnation.
Dan Conkle ************************************** Daniel O. Conkle Professor of Law Indiana University School of Law Bloomington, Indiana 47405 (812) 855-4331 fax (812) 855-0555 e-mail [EMAIL PROTECTED] ************************************** -----Original Message----- From: Volokh, Eugene [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, June 26, 2003 2:11 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Lawrence vs. Glucksberg I'm certainly not going to mourn the demise of sodomy laws, which I've long thought were quite outrageous. But I'm wondering about the boundaries of the majority's logic, and in particular how it relates to the right to assisted suicide rejected in Glucksberg. Wouldn't a right to decide how to die be as important to one's "dignity as [a] free person[]" as the right to build sexual relationships? I realize that there are stronger arguments for why the government may properly burden or even prohibit the exercise of that right; but Glucksberg held that the right really isn't protected by anything more than a rational basis test, relying largely on the "only traditional rights" rationale that Lawrence seems to pretty decisively reject. Is this still sound post-Lawrence? Eugene
