Bowers v. Hardwick
E508237
Bowers v. Hardwick was a 1986 U.S. Supreme Court case that upheld the constitutionality of a Georgia sodomy law criminalizing consensual same-sex intimacy, later overturned by Lawrence v. Texas in 2003.
All labels observed (2)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| Bowers v. Hardwick canonical | 3 |
| Bowers v. Hardwick, 478 U.S. 186 (1986) | 1 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T5295694 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Bowers v. Hardwick Context triple: [majority opinion in Bowers v. Hardwick, partOf, Bowers v. Hardwick]
-
A.
Lawrence v. Texas (in part)
Lawrence v. Texas (in part) is a landmark 2003 U.S. Supreme Court decision that struck down laws criminalizing consensual same-sex intimacy, expanding constitutional protections for LGBTQ+ individuals.
-
B.
Loving v. Virginia
Loving v. Virginia is a landmark 1967 U.S. Supreme Court decision that struck down state laws banning interracial marriage, affirming marriage as a fundamental right under the Fourteenth Amendment.
-
C.
Obergefell v. Hodges
Obergefell v. Hodges is the landmark 2015 U.S. Supreme Court decision that legalized same-sex marriage nationwide by ruling that same-sex couples have a constitutional right to marry.
-
D.
Edwards v. California
Edwards v. California is a 1941 U.S. Supreme Court case that struck down a California law restricting the bringing of indigent persons into the state, holding that such limits on interstate movement violated the Commerce Clause.
-
E.
Reed v. Reed
Reed v. Reed is a landmark 1971 U.S. Supreme Court case that for the first time struck down a law for discriminating on the basis of sex under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Bowers v. Hardwick Target entity description: Bowers v. Hardwick was a 1986 U.S. Supreme Court case that upheld the constitutionality of a Georgia sodomy law criminalizing consensual same-sex intimacy, later overturned by Lawrence v. Texas in 2003.
-
A.
Lawrence v. Texas (in part)
Lawrence v. Texas (in part) is a landmark 2003 U.S. Supreme Court decision that struck down laws criminalizing consensual same-sex intimacy, expanding constitutional protections for LGBTQ+ individuals.
-
B.
Loving v. Virginia
Loving v. Virginia is a landmark 1967 U.S. Supreme Court decision that struck down state laws banning interracial marriage, affirming marriage as a fundamental right under the Fourteenth Amendment.
-
C.
Obergefell v. Hodges
Obergefell v. Hodges is the landmark 2015 U.S. Supreme Court decision that legalized same-sex marriage nationwide by ruling that same-sex couples have a constitutional right to marry.
-
D.
Edwards v. California
Edwards v. California is a 1941 U.S. Supreme Court case that struck down a California law restricting the bringing of indigent persons into the state, holding that such limits on interstate movement violated the Commerce Clause.
-
E.
Reed v. Reed
Reed v. Reed is a landmark 1971 U.S. Supreme Court case that for the first time struck down a law for discriminating on the basis of sex under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (46)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
United States Supreme Court case
ⓘ
landmark court decision ⓘ |
| appliesConstitutionalProvision |
Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution
ⓘ
linked to:
Fourteenth Amendment
|
| concernsIssue |
criminalization of consensual same-sex sodomy
ⓘ
right to privacy under the Due Process Clause ⓘ |
| concernsLaw | Georgia sodomy statute ⓘ |
| hasChiefJusticeAtTime | Warren E. Burger ⓘ |
| hasCitation | 478 U.S. 186 ⓘ |
| hasConstitutionalDoctrine |
right to privacy
ⓘ
substantive due process ⓘ |
| hasCountry |
United States
ⓘ
linked to:
United States of America
|
| hasCourt | Supreme Court of the United States ⓘ |
| hasDecisionDate | 1986-06-30 ⓘ |
| hasDocketNumber | No. 85-140 ⓘ |
| hasEffect | upheld state power to criminalize consensual same-sex intimacy until overruled ⓘ |
| hasHolding |
Georgia’s sodomy law is constitutional under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment
ⓘ
The Constitution does not confer a fundamental right upon homosexuals to engage in sodomy ⓘ |
| hasImpactOn |
LGBT rights in the United States
ⓘ
privacy rights jurisprudence ⓘ substantive due process jurisprudence ⓘ |
| hasJusticeInDissent |
Harry A. Blackmun
ⓘ
John Paul Stevens ⓘ Thurgood Marshall ⓘ William J. Brennan Jr. ⓘ |
| hasJusticeInMajority |
Lewis F. Powell Jr.
ⓘ
Sandra Day O’Connor ⓘ Warren E. Burger ⓘ William H. Rehnquist ⓘ |
| hasKeyPhrase | no fundamental right to engage in homosexual sodomy ⓘ |
| hasLegalArea |
LGBT rights law
ⓘ
constitutional law ⓘ criminal law ⓘ |
| hasLowerCourt | United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit ⓘ |
| hasMajorityOpinionBy | Byron R. White ⓘ |
| hasOverrulingCaseCitation |
Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558 (2003)
ⓘ
linked to:
Lawrence v. Texas (in part)
|
| hasPetitioner | Michael J. Bowers ⓘ |
| hasProceduralPosture | appeal from the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit ⓘ |
| hasRegionOfLaw | Georgia ⓘ |
| hasRespondent | Michael Hardwick ⓘ |
| hasStateInvolved | Georgia ⓘ |
| hasSubject | constitutionality of sodomy laws ⓘ |
| hasSubsequentHistory | explicitly overruled by Lawrence v. Texas in 2003 ⓘ |
| hasTypeOfConductAtIssue | private, consensual, adult same-sex sexual conduct ⓘ |
| hasVoteSplit | 5–4 ⓘ |
| hasYearDecided | 1986 ⓘ |
| overruledBy |
Lawrence v. Texas
ⓘ
linked to:
Lawrence v. Texas (in part)
|
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: Bowers v. Hardwick Description of subject: Bowers v. Hardwick was a 1986 U.S. Supreme Court case that upheld the constitutionality of a Georgia sodomy law criminalizing consensual same-sex intimacy, later overturned by Lawrence v. Texas in 2003.
Referenced by (4)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.
linked to: Bowers v. Hardwick