Ripple Effect.

In the next two weeks, the Supreme Court will rule, in Lawrence v. Texas, on the constitutionality of Texas's law criminalizing consensual homosexual sodomy. The case involves the arrests and convictions of John Lawrence and Tyron Garner, who were discovered having sex in Lawrence's bedroom when police responded to a false report by a neighbor that a man was "going crazy" in the apartment. If, as anticipated, the Supremes overturn the Texas law, their ruling would invalidate four anti-sodomy laws punishing same-sex behavior, or 13 such laws outlawing same-and opposite-sex behavior, depending on the grounds on which they rule. Sodomy laws loom large in family-law matters and especially in custody and visitation cases. They are frequently invoked to paint gay parents as criminals who cannot provide good homes for children, even in cases where the evidence is clear that the child prefers--or is safer--living with the gay parent. Sodomy laws have also been invoked in employment-discrimination cases. Should the Supreme Court overturn Texas's sodomy law, it will provide protection not only for the unlucky few who find themselves prosecuted for consensual sex but for the many more who face legal discrimination justified by such laws.