Protecting Defendants UAB PSC 381 Bill of Rights Rochin v. California, 342 U.S. 165 (1952) Schmerber v. California, 384 U.S. 757 (1966) Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 (1965) Loving v. Virginia, 388 U.S. 1 (1967) Bowers v. Hardick Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558 (2003)

1. Protecting Defendants
PSC 381 Bill of Rights

2. Facts: Rochin swallowed drug capsules to dispose of evidence. The
police pummeled him and jumped on his stomach in a vain effort to
make him throw up. They took him to a hospital where a doctor was
instructed by the police officers to administer an emetic by forcibly
passing a tube into Rochin's stomach. He vomited the capsules and
was convicted on the basis of the evidence produced from his vomit.
Rochin v. California, 342 U.S. 165 (1952)

3. Issue: Did the police procedure forcing Rochin to vomit violate the
Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination and the Due
Process Clause of the 14th Amendment?
Rochin v. California, 342 U.S. 165 (1952)

4. Holding: The Court reversed the conviction.
The police violated Rochin's right to due process of law. Due process
was an admittedly vague concept, but it prohibited "conduct that
shocks the conscience."
Rochin v. California, 342 U.S. 165 (1952)

5. Facts: Schmerber had been arrested for drunk driving while receiving
treatment for injuries in a hospital. During his treatment, a police
officer ordered a doctor to take a blood sample which indicated that
Schmerber had been drunk while driving. The blood test was
introduced as evidence in court and Schmerber was convicted.
Schmerber v. California, 384 U.S. 757 (1966)

6. Issue: Did the blood test violate the Fifth Amendment guarantee
against self-incrimination?
Schmerber v. California, 384 U.S. 757 (1966)

7. Holding: No. Justice Brennan argued for a 5-4 majority that the
protection against self-incrimination applied specifically to compelled
communications or testimony. Since the results of the blood test
were neither "testimony nor evidence relating to some
communicative act or writing by the petitioner, it was not
inadmissible on privilege grounds."
Schmerber v. California, 384 U.S. 757 (1966)

8. ● Rights thus far have been enumerated (numbered).
● Penumbral rights occupy the space between the numbers.
● Penumbra is “a space of partial illumination between the perfect
shadow … on all sides and the full light…”
● Penumbra as a legal metaphor dates back to 1871 ultimately
developing into the Penumbral Doctrine:
○ The "outer bounds of authority emanating from a law." -
Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
● Penumbral rights occupy the space between enumerated rights.
Birth of Penumbral Rights

9. Penumbra Illustrated

10. Facts: Griswold was the Executive Director of the Planned
Parenthood League of Connecticut. Both she and the Medical
Director for the League gave information, instruction, and other
medical advice to married couples concerning birth control.
Griswold and her colleague were convicted under a Connecticut law
which criminalized the provision of counselling, and other medical
treatment, to married persons for purposes of preventing conception.
Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 (1965)

11. Issue: Does the Constitution protect the right of marital privacy
against state restrictions on a couple's ability to be counseled in the
use of contraceptives?
Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 (1965)

12. Holding: Though the Constitution does not explicitly protect a general
right to privacy, the various guarantees within the Bill of Rights create
penumbras, or zones, that establish a right to privacy.
Together, the First, Third, Fourth, and Ninth Amendments, create a
new constitutional right, the right to privacy in marital relations.
The Connecticut statute conflicts with the exercise of this right and is
therefore null and void.
Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 (1965)

13. noun | mis·ce·ge·na·tion | (ˌ)mi-ˌse-jə-ˈnā-shən, ˌmi-si-jə-ˈnā-
a mixture of races; especially: marriage, cohabitation, or sexual
intercourse between a white person and a member of another race.
Miscegenation

14. Facts: In 1958, two residents of Virginia, Mildred Jeter, a black
woman, and Richard Loving, a white man, were married in the District
of Columbia.
The Lovings returned to Virginia shortly thereafter. The couple was
then charged with violating the state's antimiscegenation statute,
which banned inter-racial marriages.
The Lovings were found guilty and sentenced to a year in jail (the trial
judge agreed to suspend the sentence if the Lovings would leave
Virginia and not return for 25 years).
Loving v. Virginia, 388 U.S. 1 (1967)

15. Issue: Did Virginia's antimiscegenation law violate the Equal
Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment?
Loving v. Virginia, 388 U.S. 1 (1967)

16. Holding: Yes. In a unanimous decision, the Court held that
distinctions drawn according to race were generally "odious to a free
people" and were subject to "the most rigid scrutiny" under the Equal
Protection Clause. The Virginia law, the Court found, had no
legitimate purpose "independent of invidious racial discrimination."
"Under our Constitution," wrote Chief Justice Earl Warren, "the
freedom to marry, or not marry, a person of another race resides with
the individual, and cannot be infringed by the State."
Loving v. Virginia, 388 U.S. 1 (1967)

17. U.S. Supreme Court (1986) ruling that upheld, in a 5–4 ruling, the
constitutionality of a Georgia sodomy law criminalizing oral and anal
sex in private between consenting adults, in this case with respect to
homosexual sodomy, though the law did not differentiate between
homosexual sodomy and heterosexual sodomy.
Bowers v. Hardick Summary

18. Facts: Responding to a reported weapons disturbance in a private
residence, Houston police entered John Lawrence's apartment and
saw him and another adult man, Tyron Garner, engaging in a private,
consensual sexual act. Lawrence and Garner were arrested and
convicted of deviate sexual intercourse in violation of a Texas statute
forbidding two persons of the same sex to engage in certain sexual
conduct.
In affirming, the State Court of Appeals held that the statute was not
unconstitutional under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth
Amendment, with Bowers v. Hardwick controlling.
Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558 (2003)

19. Issue: Do the criminal convictions of John Lawrence and Tyron
Garner under the Texas "Homosexual Conduct" law, which
criminalizes sexual intimacy by same-sex couples, but not identical
behavior by different-sex couples, violate the Fourteenth Amendment
guarantee of equal protection of laws?
Do their criminal convictions for adult consensual sexual intimacy in
the home violate their vital interests in liberty and privacy protected
by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment?
Should Bowers v. Hardwick be overruled?
Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558 (2003)

20. Holding: No, yes, and yes. In a 6-3 opinion delivered by Justice
Kennedy, the Court held that the Texas statute making it a crime for
two persons of the same sex to engage in certain sexual conduct
violates the Due Process Clause. The Court reasoned that the case
turned on whether Lawrence and Garner were free as adults to
engage in the private conduct in the exercise of their liberty under the
Due Process Clause. "Their right to liberty under the DPC gives them
the full right to engage in their conduct without intervention of the
government." "The Texas statute furthers no legitimate state interest
which can justify its intrusion into the personal and private life of the
individual." Accordingly, the Court overruled Bowers.
Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558 (2003)

21. ● In addition to criminal procedure protections (search and seizure,
counsel, jury trial, no self-incrimination, counsel), criminal statutes
themselves may be challenged as violating the U.S. Constitution.
● Criminal statutes may not offend enumerated rights.
● Or penumbral rights - like the right of privacy.
Recap

22. Attributions:
"Rochin v. California." Oyez, https://www.oyez.org/cases/1940-1955/342us165. Accessed 30 Mar. 2017.
"Schmerber v. California." Oyez, https://www.oyez.org/cases/1965/658. Accessed 30 Mar. 2017.
“Penumbra.” Merriam Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, 10th ed., 1996.
Penumbra Image courtesy of DiractDelta Science & Engineering.
“Miscegentation.” https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/miscegenation. Accessed 30 Mar. 2017.
"Lawrence v. Texas." Oyez, https://www.oyez.org/cases/2002/02-102. Accessed 30 Mar. 2017.
For additional information:
Brandon L. Blankenship
UAB | Department of Government
(205)912-8248 | blbjd@uab.edu
Attributions and Additional Information: