The Case File
The year the Supreme Court decided Griswold v. Connecticut.
What is 1965?
What is the assisting/abetting/accessory portion of the statute.
The general constitutional concept established in Griswold, even though it is not explicitly mentioned in the Constitution.
What is the right to privacy?
The executive director of the Planned Parenthood League of Connecticut who was arrested.
Who is Estelle Griswold?
The later case that expanded the right to contraception beyond married couples, based on the same privacy principles.
What is Eisenstadt v. Baird?
The official name of the organization Estelle Griswold and Dr. C. Lee Buxton were affiliated with when they were arrested.
What is the Planned Parenthood League of Connecticut?
The Connecticut law, enacted in 1879, was known by this specific term.
What is the Comstock Act?
This amendment is most commonly associated with the right to privacy regarding a person's home and papers, cited by Justice Douglas in his opinion.
What is the Fourth Amendment?
The doctor and professor at Yale Medical School who was arrested alongside Griswold.
Who is Dr. C. Lee Buxton?
This landmark abortion rights case, decided in 1973, also relied heavily on the precedent of a constitutional right to privacy established in Griswold.
What is Roe v. Wade?
The specific services Griswold and Buxton were providing that led to their arrest under Connecticut state law.
What are providing information, instruction, and medical advice to married couples concerning birth control?
This law not only made it illegal to use birth control but also made it a crime to do this for others.
What is providing information or instruction on how to use birth control?
Justice Douglas's majority opinion found the right to privacy in the "penumbras" of these specific amendments.
What are the First, Third, Fourth, Fifth, and Ninth Amendments?
The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court who wrote the majority opinion.
Who is William O. Douglas?
The Griswold decision established that the government cannot infringe on the right to privacy, especially concerning these intimate relationships.
What are marital relationships?
This was the specific charge brought against Griswold and Buxton.
What is aiding and abetting married couples to use birth control?
The Comstock laws are named after this anti-vice crusader.
Who is Anthony Comstock?
This amendment's inclusion in the "penumbras" is based on the idea that the right to privacy protects a "zone of privacy" in intimate family matters.
What is the Ninth Amendment?
The type of doctor who was arrested in he case.
What is a gynecologist?
The Griswold ruling is foundational to the "substantive due process" tradition, which recognizes fundamental rights not explicitly listed in the Constitution under this amendment.
What is the Fourteenth Amendment?
The Supreme Court's final decision was that the Connecticut law was unconstitutional for this reason.
What is it violated the right to marital privacy?
The Connecticut law's reach extended beyond married couples, but the Supreme Court's ruling in Griswold specifically focused on the privacy rights of this group.
What are married couples.
The dissenting opinion argued that the Court should not create new rights, and that creating the right to privacy was an example of this.
What is judicial overreach and acting as a legislative body?
This dissenting Justice wrote "I like my privacy as well as the next one, but I am nevertheless compelled to admit that government has a right to invade it..."
Who is Justice Black?
In his Griswold opinion, Justice Douglas famously used this phrase to describe the right to privacy that emanates from the Bill of Rights.
What are "penumbras and emanations"?