Griswold v. Connecticut

A 1965 U.S. Supreme Court decision that struck down Connecticut’s ban on contraceptive use by married couples, recognizing constitutional protection for marital privacy.

Right to privacy in the United States: A body of constitutional protections against certain government intrusions into private life. The Court located marital privacy within constitutional protections, although the Constitution does not expressly name a general privacy right.
Connecticut Comstock Act: A Connecticut law that criminalized using or assisting in the use of contraception. This was the statute the Court invalidated as applied to married couples.
William O. Douglas: An associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court from 1939 to 1975 who wrote the Griswold majority opinion. His opinion argued that specific constitutional guarantees create zones of privacy.
Griswold v. Connecticut dissent: The opinions by Justices Hugo Black and Potter Stewart rejecting the majority’s reasoning in Griswold v. Connecticut. The dissents expose the dispute over whether the Constitution supports an unwritten privacy right.
Contraception in the United States: The use, availability, regulation, and social history of methods for preventing pregnancy in the United States. Griswold ended state enforcement of Connecticut’s contraceptive ban against married couples.
Penumbra (law): A legal metaphor for implied rights inferred from the guarantees explicitly stated in a constitution. Justice William O. Douglas used implied protections surrounding enumerated rights to explain the decision.
Estelle Griswold: An American reproductive-rights activist who directed the Planned Parenthood clinic at the center of Griswold v. Connecticut. She helped open the clinic and was prosecuted for providing contraceptive information.
Arthur Goldberg: An associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court from 1962 to 1965 who wrote a concurrence in Griswold v. Connecticut. He grounded marital privacy in the Ninth Amendment and the Fourteenth Amendment.
Skinner v. Oklahoma: A 1942 Supreme Court decision striking down a law that required sterilization of some repeat criminals. It had treated procreation as a fundamental interest before Griswold addressed contraception.
Lawrence v. Texas: A 2003 Supreme Court decision invalidating laws criminalizing consensual same-sex intimacy. The opinion invoked constitutional liberty in intimate life, a doctrine shaped partly by Griswold.

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