The facts, without the lore
In 1998 Harris County sheriff’s officers entered an apartment in Houston, Texas, responding to a reported weapons disturbance. They found two men, John Geddes Lawrence and Tyron Garner. Texas charged them under Penal Code § 21.06, “homosexual conduct”: deviate sexual intercourse with another person of the same sex, a Class C misdemeanor. They were convicted. They appealed.
Whether every detail of that night happened as later retold is a historians’ fight (see Dale Carpenter’s Flagrant Conduct). For constitutional law, the record the Court accepted was enough: adults, private home, consensual sex, a statute that named only same-sex couples.
What the Court held
On June 26, 2003, Justice Kennedy wrote for a 6–3 Court. Private consensual sexual conduct between adults is protected by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The Texas statute furthered no legitimate state interest that could justify intrusion into that liberty. Bowers v. Hardwick, 478 U.S. 186 (1986), which had upheld Georgia’s sodomy law, was overruled. Justice O’Connor concurred on equal protection grounds: a law that criminalized the same act only for same-sex couples failed even deferential review.
“The petitioners are entitled to respect for their private lives. The State cannot demean their existence or control their destiny by making their private sexual conduct a crime.” — Kennedy, J., Lawrence, 539 U.S. at 578.
What it did not do
It did not create a right to sex in public, with minors, or without consent. It did not, by itself, require states to recognize marriage — that arrived in Obergefell v. Hodges (2015). It did not magically delete statute books. Repeal is a legislative act. A Supreme Court holding makes a law unenforceable against the protected conduct; the text can sit there looking official until someone votes.
Why the leftover text still matters
After Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization (2022) overturned Roe, Justice Thomas’s concurrence invited the Court to “reconsider” Lawrence and Obergefell. That is why activists call remaining sodomy clauses “zombie statutes.” If the constitutional floor moved, the old felonies would not need to be rewritten. They would only need a prosecutor.
In ordinary life they still cause smaller harms: they are cited in family-court mudslinging, immigration character evidence, sex-education scripts (Texas health code has, at times, instructed that “homosexual conduct is a criminal offense under Section 21.06”), and the dignity tax of opening a code and finding your evening listed next to actual crimes.
Read the thing
Opinion: 539 U.S. 558. Statute: Texas Penal Code § 21.06. Context: Eskridge, Dishonorable Passions; Carpenter, Flagrant Conduct. For the list of states that still print the offence, see United States.
Educational material, not a diagnosis, prescription, or legal opinion. Consenting adults only. Laws change; check primary sources and a licensed professional in your jurisdiction. If you are in danger, local emergency services come first.