Rick Santorum Deserves An Apology

26 Jun, 2003 by John Hawkins

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Rick Santorum Deserves An Apology: I’m not going to endlessly pontificate about the SCOTUS decision in the Texas sodomy case, although I believe that it was little more than six justices overturning a law based on their personal beliefs, dressing it up a little, and twisting the Constitution to try to justify their decision. Our Constitution dies a little bit every time the SCOTUS decides the, “ends justifies the means” as they did in Lawrence v. Texas. Whether you agree with sodomy laws or not (and I don’t), the SCOTUS should have let the people of Texas decide whether this law should stay on the books.

Furthermore, I thought it was worth pointing out that there are a lot of people who should be apologizing for their hysterical attacks on Rick Santorum. Scalia raised many of the same concerns in his dissent (Adobe Acrobat File) that Santorum was viciously attacked for pointing out…

“State laws against bigamy, same-sex marriage, adult incest, prostitution, masturbation, adultery, fornication, bestiality, and obscenity are likewise sustainable only in light of Bowers’ validation of laws based on moral choices. Every single one of these laws is called into question by today’s decision; the Court makes no effort to cabin the scope of its decision to exclude them from its holding.”

Moreover, in the dissent written by Clarence Thomas (Adobe Acrobat File), the non-existent right to privacy in the Constitution — something else Santorum was excoriated for mentioning — came up…

“Like Justice Stewart, I can find neither in the Bill of Rights nor any other part of the Constitution a general right of privacy, ibid., or as the Court terms it today, the liberty of the person both in its spatial and more transcendent dimensions, ante, at 1.”

As I said at the time, Santorum was right on target with his concerns and the people who publicly flogged him for comments were wrong to do so — although I doubt that you’ll see any of them admit it…