You know, the “Not work safe. Not family safe. Not very safe at all” one that cracked us up a few weeks ago?
Thought you might want to know what our Jane, innocently perusing an appellate-practice blog called How Appealing, has run up on in the way of an update:
“This case assesses the constitutionality of a Texas statute making it a crime to promote or sell sexual devices.” So begins a ruling that a partially divided three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit issued today. And, by a vote of 2-1, the appellate court holds that “the statute has provisions that violate the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.”
According to the majority opinion:
Because of Lawrence, the issue before us is whether the Texas statute impermissibly burdens the individual’s substantive due process right to engage in private intimate conduct of his or her choosing. Contrary to the district court’s conclusion, we hold that the Texas law burdens this constitutional right. An individual who wants to legally use a safe sexual device during private intimate moments alone or with another is unable to legally purchase a device in Texas, which heavily burdens a constitutional right. …
Yes, the Fifth (except for that one bozo) said that. Somewhere good ol’ Molly’s laffin’, I just know it. Salud, grrrl!
Does this mean there is a circuit split between the 11th and 5th Circuits on sex toys? I seem to remember the Alabama statute was upheld.
Do we have the possibility of reading a Clarence Thomas opinion about sex toys in our future? Creeeeepy!
I thought this ruling killed the comedic aspects of the sex-toy law but, NMC, you’ve opened up whole new vistas.
And you remember correctly, according to this law.com piece:
http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1090180191546
Dueling dild*es.
In the category of whole new vistas, doncha wonder what ads are fixin’ to show up on this thread.
Yeah – useful ones!
That will really be interesting!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The north Alabama district court opinion overturning the Alabama statute (an opinion that is online somewhere) is hilarious– has a long history of d*ldoes going back to the Victorians.
The Alabama District Court reversed the ban as I recall and then the 11th Circuit reversed and remanded in part. I read somewhere that the Supremes were thinking about looking at the Constitutionality of such laws.
NMC 6! Mind yer spelling on here or lawd knows what we git next!
I just heard from a major MS law firm that their ISP was blocking this site “due to [objectionable] content.” Now I figured that might mean “objectionable to some friend of Dickie’s,” but let us be keerful.
P.S. Talk about mos’ any ol’ thing here, but camouflage your spelling of some spam-attracting things, okay, everybody?
Why am I getting an ad for a weekly email from Ann Coulter?
Lotus in 8:
You aren’t going to be able to print that ND Alabama opinion without censoring it I don’t think.
Researcher in 9:
Because those are the advertisements that Google delivers to Folo.
I knew that. I was wondering why this content triggered a Coulter ad. Then I got a Newt Gingrich ad. Never mind. I don’t want to know how the Google’s software works.
Lotus, as a new comer I wondered where that was going to go. HA
N.b. that the 5th Circuit reads Carey v. Population Services correctly, unlike the Miss. Supreme Court in its dunderheaded opinion upholding the sex-toy ban.
Here’s hoping someone goes to Miss. district court with the present op in hand. PHE, Inc., plaintiff-intervenor in the 5th Circuit case, was the appellant in the Miss. state case.
OTOH, look for this one to go en banc — Barksdale may prevail yet. Presumably, a West Point grad can give his lady an orgasm without any of those silly gadgets.