Flagrant Conduct

This book delves into the landmark Supreme Court decision of 2003 that invalidated America’s sodomy laws. It explores the arrest of two men in Houston for a minor criminal offense that exposed a deep malignity in our judicial system, challenging the traditional conception of what makes a family. Drawing on dozens of interviews, the author skillfully navigates Houston’s complex gay world of the late 1990s and charts not only the careful legal strategy that Lambda Legal attorneys adopted to make the case compatible to a conservative Supreme Court but also the miscalculations of the Houston prosecutors who assumed that the nation’s extant sodomy laws would be upheld. It compellingly demonstrates that gay history is an integral part of our national civil rights story.