Griswold v. Connecticut

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Griswold v. Connecticut (1965)

Syllabus

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Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 (1965), was a landmark case in which the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that the Constitution protected a right to privacy. The case involved a Connecticut law that prohibited the use of contraceptives. By a vote of 7-2, the Supreme Court invalidated the law on the grounds that it violated the "right to marital privacy".

79844Griswold v. Connecticut — Syllabus1965

Court Documents

Opinion of the Court

Concurring Opinions: Goldberg; Harlan; White

Dissenting Opinions: Black; Stewart

Supreme Court of the United States

381 U.S. 479

Griswold v. Connecticut

Appeal from the Supreme Court of Errors of Connecticut

No. 496 Argued: March 29-30, 1965 --- Decided: June 7, 1965

Appellants, the Executive Director of the Planned Parenthood League of Connecticut, and its medical director, a licensed physician, were convicted as accessories for giving married persons information and medical advice on how to prevent conception and, following examination, prescribing a contraceptive device or material for the wife's use. A Connecticut statute makes it a crime for any person to use any drug or article to prevent conception. Appellants claimed that the accessory statute, as applied, violated the Fourteenth Amendment. An intermediate appellate court and the State's highest court affirmed the judgment.

Held:

1. Appellants have standing to assert the constitutional rights of the married people. Tileston v. Ullman, 318 U.S. 44, distinguished. P. 481.

2. The Connecticut statute forbidding use of contraceptives violates the right of marital privacy which is within the penumbra of specific guarantees of the Bill of Rights. Pp. 481-486. [p480]

This work is in the public domain in the United States because it is a work of the United States federal government (see 17 U.S.C. 105).

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