October 13 in Queer History,

Born this day:

Kele Okereke – Singer, Bloc Party

Alan Bray ( 1948 - 2001), UK. Historian, Activist.
Two books of importance to gay non - specialists are Homosexuality in Renaissance England, and "The Friend"

Sodomy in History, October 13

1964 — At oral argument in the U.S. Supreme Court, Chief Justice Earl Warren demands that Mississippi strike from its brief an allegation that civil rights defendant Aaron Henry had been arrested for sex with another man. Warren claims that Mississippi is "poisoning the mind of the Court and the nation."

1982 — The Maryland Court of Appeals overturns the disorderly conduct conviction of a man who said "Fuck You" to a police officer. The Court noted that the arrest was illegal unless the police officer would testify that he was sexually aroused at the thought of being fucked by another man.

2000 — The Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals reverses a trial court and upholds an Alabama law banning sex toys.

October 14

1927 — A California appellate court rules that corroborative evidence in crime against nature and oral copulation cases can be entirely circumstantial.

1941 — A newspaper reports that the Ohio Pardon and Parole Commission adopted a policy the previous year of requiring all males convicted of sex crimes to be sexually sterilized before release. The surgery performed leaves the men permanently impotent.

1986 — The U.S. Supreme Court refuses to review the decision of the Oklahoma Court of Appeals that the state’s sodomy law can not be enforced constitutionally against people of the opposite sex.

1986 — The Georgia Court of Appeals upholds a sodomy conviction even though the defendant claimed that what he was charged with doing was "anatomically impossible." The court does not detail the act.

October 15

1918 — The Oregon Supreme Court upholds a sodomy conviction after the prosecutor made reference in the trial to the "past glories of Greece."

1963 — The Georgia Supreme Court overrules a 1917 precedent and holds that cunnilingus is not a violation of the sodomy law.

1975 — The North Carolina Court of Appeals rules that penetration is not necessary to complete an attempt to commit sodomy.

1998 — A federal judge strikes down Maryland’s "unnatural and perverted practices" law on broad privacy grounds and the state does not appeal.

October 16

1749 — North Carolina adopts the English sodomy law explicitly.

1943 — The Tennessee Supreme Court rules that fellatio is prohibited by the state’s "crime against nature" law, although the decision is neither published nor publicized.

1958 — The District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals overturns a conviction for sodomy after the police entered without a warrant to search the defendant’s home.