07.22.06
Living in Sin, But Not in Contravention of the Law!
Even though I’m in self-imposed bar exam exile, I can’t pass up some good old-fashioned civil liberties news. In North Carolina this week, a judge declared that a law - enacted in 1805 - prohibiting unmarried couples from living together was unconstitutional. Sometimes, ancient laws like this remain on the books but are relatively harmless because they are never enforced…until someone comes along and decides he wants to enforce it. We saw this in action when Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, in his campaign against gay marriage, dug up a 1913 law (originally aimed at preventing interracial marriages) that prohibits people from marrying in Massachusetts that couldn’t be legally married in their home state. It was a sad day when the Supreme Judicial Court held that the law could actually be used.
But this time, it was a North Carolina Sheriff who, upon discovering that his 39-year-old dispatcher was living with her boyfriend in sin, dug up the old law that stated: “If any man and woman, not being married to each other, shall lewdly and lasciviously associate, bed and cohabit together, they shall be guilty of a Class 2 misdemeanor.” He threatened Deborah Hobbs with the loss of her job if she didn’t marry the punk or move out. So she quit…and sued, of course. Superior Court Judge Benjamin Alford relied on the watershed case (affectionately known in private circles as the “Butt Sex Case”) of Lawrence v. Texas, in which the Supreme Court held that sexual relations between consenting adults was constitutionally protected, dammit.
Interestingly, this law wasn’t just sitting around waiting for a good ole boy like Sherriff Carson Smith to dust it off:
[NC ACLU Director Jennifer] Rudinger said that since 1997, the law has spawned about 36 criminal cases in North Carolina. State officials have said the number of people actually convicted under the law — formally known as the fornication and adultery statute — is not clear.
The law also has been used to deny compensation to crime victims, child custody, health benefits, probation and parole, Rudinger said.
And the AP is reporting today that, apparently, the law hasn’t really been struck down and that other North Carolina law enforcement officials can continue to prosecute under it until the decision is appealed…yet the Attorney General’s office says they haven’t decided whether to appeal or not. So try to figure that one out, sinners!
But legal experts argue that the judge’s ruling affects only those involved in the litigation. Law enforcement officers and district attorneys elsewhere in the state still could prosecute couples living together out of wedlock, they said.
“It’s not until it gets up to the Court of Appeals that it applies statewide,” said Dan Pollitt, a constitutional law professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
