Pennsylvania
- Statute: Ruled unconstitutional 1980, repealed by the legislature in 1995
- Case Law: Commonwealth v. Bonadio, 415 A.2d 47 (Pa. 1980)
History
1682 A
criminal code enacted in this Quaker colony sets the maximum penalty for
sodomy at six months in jail, the only non-capital sodomy law in the American
colonies. This leniency ends when Quakers lose control of the colony.
1700 Pennsylvania’s
new sodomy law, limited only to men, sets the penalty for a first offense at
life imprisonment, with a flogging possible every three months during the
first year of imprisonment and, if married, he was to be castrated and his
wife offered a divorce.
1722 Pennsylvania
enacts the first law in the colonies requiring the posting of a bond for the
good behavior of convicted sodomites being brought into the colony.
1786 Pennsylvania
becomes the first state to abolish the death penalty for sodomy.
1879 Pennsylvania
enacts the nation’s first law explicitly covering fellatio. The law ignores
cunnilingus.
1890 The
case of Commonwealth v. King is the only published sodomy case in U.S.
history to be officially reported in a newspaper rather than a law reporter.
1933 An
appellate court upholds the conviction of a man for sodomy who asked to strip
naked in the courtroom to prove that he was “normal.”
1946 The
Pennsylvania Supreme Court overturns the conviction of a man for engaging in
sodomy with his eight-year-old son after it noted the charge was filed by the
man’s housekeeper only after he rebuffed her sexual advances.
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