Connecticut
History
1656 New
Haven Colony (later merged into Connecticut) adopts the first law in what
became the United States specifically to outlaw sex between two women. There
are no prosecutions under the law, which is a capital offense.
1821 A
revision of the state’s colonial-era sodomy law reduces the penalty from
death to life imprisonment and, probably unwittingly makes two other changes
to the law. First, it is worded uniquely that either sex can be the
perpetrator, but only a male can be a victim. Second, it refers to “carnal
knowledge of a man,” thus probably becoming the first state to outlaw
fellatio.
1863 The
Connecticut Supreme Court is the first in the nation to find that deadly force
is allowable to prevent an act of sodomy.
1891 The
Connecticut Supreme Court affirms a lower court in granting damages to a man
for the injury his teenage son suffered from a sexual relationship with
another teenage boy.
1970 Connecticut’s
Commissioner of Motor Vehicles John Tynan denies a driver’s license to a man
with a sodomy conviction on his record, saying the man “is an admitted
homosexual” and “his homosexuality makes him an improper person to hold an
operator’s license.” Connecticut Attorney General Robert Killian upholds
Tynan’s decision. The man denied his license later commits suicide.
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