Full Description
Where did the right to privacy come from and what does it mean? Grappling with the critical issues involving women and gays that relate to the recent Supreme Court appointment, Vincent J. Samar develops a definition of legal privacy, discusses the reasons why and the degree to which privacy should be protected, and shows the relationship between privacy and personal autonomy. He answers former Supreme Court nominee Robert Bork's questions about scope, content, and legal justification for a general right to privacy and emphasizes issues involving gays and lesbians, Samar maintains that these privacy issues share a common constitutional-ethical underpinning with issues such as abortion, surrogate motherhood, drug testing, and the right to die. Author note: Vincent J. Samar is Adjunct Professor of Philosophy at Loyola University of Chicago and a law professor at Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago/Kent College of Law. A practicing attorney, he is an activist in Chicago's gay and lesbian communities.
Contents
Preface IntroductionI: Theory 1. The Objects of Legal Privacy Analyzing Privacy * Historical Antecedents * Privacy in the Law Today * How Courts Justify Decisions 2. The Concept of Legal Privacy Problems with the Current Definitions * A Conceptual Methodology * The Definition of Legal Privacy * The Coverage-Protection Distinction 3. A Justification for Legal Privacy A Normative Methodology * What a Privacy Justification Is * Privacy and Autonomy Part II: Practice 4. Legal Epistemology and Privacy Dworkin's Interpretative Theory * Mohr's Privacy Justification * Hixon's Utilitarian Approach to Privacy 5. Applications Criteria for Dispute Resolutions * The Openly Gay or Lesbian Teacher * Gay and Lesbian Parenting and Marriage * Surrogate Motherhood * Privacy and AIDS * Adult Consensual Sodomy Statutes * The Justification of Abortion * Computer Data Banks and Electronic Funds * Transfer Services * Pornography and Drugs in the Home * Employer Drug and Polygraph Testing * The Right to Die Epilogue: Autonomy: The Ultimate Question Conclusion Notes Selected Bibliography Index
