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By ROBERT CROWE Copyright 2003 Houston Chronicle From exotic drag queens strutting their stuff to colorful floats sporting gay and lesbian activists, the Houston Pride Parade on Saturday night attracted a large, festive crowd. While just as flamboyant as it has been during its previous 24 years, the atmosphere was charged by the U.S. Supreme Court's recent ruling that overturned Texas' sodomy law. "This is overwhelming and still seems a little unreal after all these years -- more than three decades of struggle -- that we're finally free in Texas and free all over the country," said Lee Harrington. A...

When gays rose up against police during the Stonewall Riots in 1969, they were living in a country that considered them criminals. But when their descendants in the struggle for equal rights march down Fifth Ave. in today's Gay Pride Parade, they will do so in a nation whose Supreme Court has forcefully ruled that they are "entitled to respect for their private lives." In the matter of Lawrence vs. Texas, the justices ruled 6 to 3 Thursday that the sodomy law in Texas, which criminalized consensual sexual activity between homosexuals, was unconstitutional. But the court didn't leave it at...

Is Lawrence Worse Than Roe? CRISIS Magazine - e-Letter June 27, 2003 ********************************************** There has been a lot of lot of talk since yesterday's Supreme Court decision in the case of Lawrence v. Texas, a dispute over Texas' law making sodomy illegal. The Supreme Court overturned that law by a vote of 6 to 3, saying that such laws "demean the lives of homosexual persons" and infringe upon their right to privacy. Let me tell you right now: Lawrence is a devastating decision, worse than most people think -- and for reasons that haven't fully dawned on them yet. I...

<p>In a gesture of gratitude for the Supreme Court's decision Thursday striking down a Texas anti-sodomy law, gay-rights activists lowered the huge rainbow flag that always flies over the city's Castro District and hoisted the Stars and Stripes in its place.</p>

<p>WASHINGTON (AP) --The Supreme Court's ruling striking down bans on gay sex also strengthens the constitutional underpinnings for legal abortion and other socially divisive issues, some legal experts say.</p> <p>The decision in many respects deals with the same issues as the court's 30-year-old Roe v. Wade ruling that provided for legal abortions. Emory University law professor David Garrow said the ruling "strengthens and enshrines" the court's thinking in the abortion case.</p>

This is what the AP reports Justice Scalia as writing in dissent in the Texas sodomy case: "The court has taken sides in the culture war," Scalia said, adding that he has "nothing against homosexuals." Here is what he actually wrote: "Let me be clear that I have nothing against homosexuals, or any other group, promoting their agenda through normal democratic means."

Today Morning, I received a phone call from a cousin living in San Francisco, who says that she was woken up from her sleep by cheering in the apartment building and street she lives in. Because of the time differences, many in San Francisco received the news of the Supreme Court ruling legalizing sodomy very early, just as they were waking up or having breakfast. Many were still at home and had not yet reported to their places of work. Apparently, the celebrations were so loud, the scenes in my cousin's apartment building resembled a great hometown sporting victory. She...

The 6-3 ruling reverses course from a ruling 17 years ago that states could punish homosexuals for what such laws historically called deviant sex. Laws forbidding homosexual sex, once universal, now are rare. Those on the books are rarely enforced but underpin other kinds of discrimination, lawyers for two Texas men had argued to the court. The men "are entitled to respect for their private lives," Kennedy wrote. "The state cannot demean their existence or control their destiny by making their private sexual conduct a crime," he said. Justices John Paul Stevens (news - web sites), David Souter (news -...

SCOTUS sided with the perverts.