Kentucky Supreme Court - Notable Cases

Notable Cases

In its short history, the Kentucky Supreme Court has not produced much jurisprudence of note. A study published in 2007 by the Supreme Court of California found that of all state supreme courts in the United States, the decisions of the Kentucky Supreme Court were the least followed by other states' appellate courts.

Notable decisions of the Kentucky Supreme Court include Kentucky v. Wasson, 842 S.W.2d 487 (Ky. 1992), in which the court invalidated the criminalization of same-sex sodomy as an Equal Protection violation. This Kentucky decision, based on the Kentucky Constitution, was made at a time when the applicable federal Equal Protection precedent was Bowers v. Hardwick, 478 U.S. 186 (1986), which held that federal constitutional protection of the right of privacy was not implicated in laws penalizing homosexual sodomy. In 2003 the United States Supreme Court reversed itself and overturned Bowers, issuing a decision in Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558 (2003) that mirrored Kentucky's Wasson ruling. While some thought the Kentucky Supreme Court Wasson opinion to have been progressive, others criticized the opinion for having no basis in the 1890 Kentucky Constitution. Some critics noted that the minutes of the 1890 Kentucky Constitutional Convention were stenographically recorded and showed no indication that the framers intended to decriminalize homosexual behavior. The opinion also influenced the decision of at least some Kentucky voters who, on November 2, 2004, approved a referendum to amend the Kentucky Constitution and adopt the Defense of Marriage Amendment, effectively depriving the Kentucky Supreme Court of the ability to rule that the state constitution permitted same sex marriage.