Gay sex in private is lawful, rules US Supreme Court

In a historic victory for the American gay rights lobby, the Supreme Court struck down a state law yesterday banning consensual sex between homosexuals, saying it was a violation of an individual's right to privacy.

In the process, the nine justices went beyond the specific Texas case before them, and struck down sodomy laws in all 13 states that still have them on the statute book, affecting both same-sex and heterosexual couples.

The ruling, made on the final day of the Supreme Court's year, was by a 6-3 majority. The dissenters were the three most conservative justices: William Rehnquist, the Chief Justice, Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas.

"The Court has largely signed on to the so-called homosexual agenda," Mr Scalia said. "It has taken sides in the culture wars."

The ruling, which reverses a judgment by the Supreme Court in 1986, stems from a case five years ago in Houston, when police burst into a private apartment in response to a burglary alarm call and found two men engaged in anal sex. The men were each fined $200 and spent a night in jail. They appealed, starting the process that led to the Supreme Court.

As recently as 1960, all 50 states had anti-sodomy laws. In 37 of them, the statutes have been either repealed or overturned by local courts. The 13 that have kept them are all in the south and west. Nine outlaw sodomy for both sexes, while four - Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Missouri - do so only for same-sex couples.

The high court was widely criticised for its 1986 ruling, which upheld an anti-homosexual sodomy law in Georgia. The state is one of the few in the south to have scrapped such a statute of its own accord.

Writing the majority opinion, Justice Anthony Kennedy said the men were entitled to privacy. Texas "cannot control their destiny by making their private sexual conduct a crime", he wrote.

Conservatives reacted furiously, saying that the judgment would undermine society and lead to same-sex marriages.