Page 156 - สิทธิมนุษยชนของบุคคลที่มีความหลากหลายทางเพศ

CONSTITUTIONS WITH çOPEN-ENDEDé PROVISIONS

AGAINST DISCRIMINATION

The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms,

enacted in 1982, came a bit too early for the express inclusion
of çsexual orientationé. However, in the first decision of the

Supreme Court of Canada on the issue, in Egan v Canada, all
nine judges held that çsexual orientationé was an analogous
ground of discrimination to those listed in the article on equality

and was therefore covered as within the category of çother
status.é

CONSTITUTIONS WITH A GENERAL EQUALITY
PROVISION

The Constitution of the United States has a general

provision on equality before the law, without any list of
prohibited grounds. The United States Supreme Court has
been notoriously conservative in recent decades. Yet in two

major decisions, the Court has invalidated anti-homosexual
laws. In Romer v Evans it invalidated a state constitutional

provision that banned any anti-discrimination laws protecting
homosexuals. In Lawrence v Texas it invalidated criminal
laws against homosexual acts.

Human Rights of Lesbians, Gays, Bisexuals, Transgender and Intersex People 159