Big boost for privacy, abortion, and gay rights | csmonitor.com

The US Supreme Court has drawn a thick constitutional curtain around the nation's bedrooms.
In a landmark 6-to-3 decision announced Thursday, America's highest court commanded the states to get out of the business of attempting to regulate what can or can't happen within private, intimate relationships between consenting adults. Instead, five of the six majority justices ruled that Americans enjoy a fundamental right to conduct the most personal and private aspects of their lives free from the prying eyes of government officials.

"Freedom extends beyond spatial bounds," writes Justice Anthony Kennedy in the majority opinion. "Liberty presumes an autonomy of self that includes freedom of thought, belief, expression, and certain intimate conduct."

In a dissent, Justice Antonin Scalia criticized "the invention of a brand-new 'constitutional right' by a court that is impatient with democratic change." He said such issues should be resolved by elected lawmakers, not decreed by judges.

The case is significant in constitutional terms because in recognizing a fundamental right to relationship privacy, the majority justices have bolstered one of the pillars of the high court's controversial 1973 abortion ruling. Thursday's decision, by finding once again that privacy in "intimate conduct" between adults is a constitutionally protected right, will make it much harder for a future court to overturn the 1973 Roe v. Wade precedent.