North Carolina Cohabitation Law Struck Down in Case of Female Sheriff Dispatcher

As some readers of this blog know, my legal scholarship focuses a lot on employee privacy issues.  Indeed, my forthcoming law review article entitled, "The (Neglected) Importance of Being Lawrence," considers how a modified Pickering test (borrowed from First Amendment public employee free speech law) can be utilized to protect public employee rights to decisional non-interference in private affairs (especially with regard to matters pertaining to sex) from overreaching government employer action.

One of the examples I used from the real world in that paper is that of a female sheriff dispatcher from Penders Country, North Carolina, who was told by the male sheriff that she had to either marry her boyfriend she was living with, move out, or find a new job.  The sheriff based his threats on an 1805 criminal anti-fornication law which prohibited unmarried individuals from living together.

To me, this was a classic case of an employer (and state) interfering with the decisional privacy interests of an employee without legitimate or substantial justification and thus, I argued, such a law should be considered unconstitutional in light of Lawrence and its emphasis on heightened sexual liberty interests.

Well, I am happy to report that a state court in North Carolina has agreed and although it is not clear the exact nature of the legal analysis employed, the North Carolina anti-fornication statute has been declared unconstitutional.  No word if an appeal by the State is contemplated.

In the meantime, this is clearly a victory for public employees and their privacy rights.

PS