Michael M. v. Superior Court of Sonoma County

Petitioner
Michael M.
Respondent
Superior Court of Sonoma County
Petitioner's Claim
That the California "statutory rape" statute unlawfully discriminated on thebasis of gender.
Chief Lawyer for Petitioner
Gregory F. Jilka
Chief Lawyer for Respondent
Sandy R. Kriegler
Justices for the Court
Harry A. Blackmun, Sandra Day O'Connor, Lewis F. Powell, Jr., William H. Rehnquist (writing for the Court), Antonin Scalia
Justices Dissenting
William J. Brennan, Jr., Thurgood Marshall, John Paul Stevens, Byron R. White
Place
Washington, D.C.
Date of Decision
23 March 1981
Decision
The Court upheld the statute.
Significance
Allowed for a sex-based bias in a statute regarding sexual offenses.
In June of 1978, three men, including the defendant Michael M., approached a16 1/2 year old female and her sister. The 16 1/2 year old, Sharon, left theothers with Michael M. and they began to kiss. When he made sexual advances and was turned away, Michael M. hit the young woman, and she then submitted tointercourse with him. A charge was filed in the Municipal Court of Sonoma County, California, that Michael M., a 17 1/2 year old male, had unlawful sexual intercourse with a woman under the age of 18, and was in violation of California's "statutory rape" statute. Michael M. sought to have this complaint set aside on both state and federal constitutional grounds, claiming that the statute unlawfully discriminated on the basis of gender since men alone couldbe charged under the law.
The California Supreme Court's Ruling
Both the trial court and the California Court of Appeals denied this request.The case was then taken to the Supreme Court of California, which upheld theCalifornia State statute. The state supreme court recognized that the statute made a distinction on the basis of sex because it provided that only malesmay violate this law, but held that this distinction was appropriate to the circumstance. The gender specific classification, it argued, was not only supported by social convention, but also by the biological fact that only the woman can become pregnant. Gender was also seen as a means for identifying boththe offender and the victim. The state's "compelling interest" in preventingteen pregnancies, the social consequences of teen pregnancies and the risks inherent in teenage childbearing also supported the court's decision.
The U.S. Supreme Court's Ruling
Appeal of this decision was taken to the U.S. Supreme Court. The Court voted5-4 to uphold the statute, but the majority could not agree on the reasons for doing so (this is called a plurality opinion). The Court stated that California's statutory rape law did not violate the Equal Protection Clause of theFourteenth Amendment. Justice Rehnquist announced the Court's decision and Justices Brennan, White, Marshall and Stevens dissented.
Justice Rehnquist's opinion made many separate arguments in favor of the statute. First, the opinion stated that gender-based classifications were not "`inherently suspect' so as to be subject to so-called `strict scrutiny,' but will be upheld if they bear a `fair and substantial relationship' to legitimatestate ends." In other words, the statute had only to prove some legitimate state end in order to be upheld. The purpose of the statute in preventing underage pregnancy was determined to be legitimate because of the potential harmthat could be done to young women. They also expressed the opinion that pregnancy poses a health risk to young women, but does not pose such a risk to men.
What is more, the justices determined that the Equal Protection Clause of theFourteenth Amendment does not necessarily require that any statute apply equally to everyone; nor does it require things which are different, such as thecircumstances surrounding gender, to be treated the same. As long as the limitations or rules being selectively applied to one gender are based on realistic sex differences, the law can be seen as constitutional.
The opinion also considered whether the statute was necessary to deter teenage pregnancy. The defendants claimed that a gender neutral statute would serveequally well. Yet the justices claimed that this was not the question at issue; the statute may not have been drawn as precisely as it might have been, but the statute was within constitutional limitations. They also reasoned thata gender-neutral statute would reduce a woman's likelihood to report violations if she herself might be subject to prosecution. The concurring justices raised the possibility that a broad statute applicable to both sexes might, infact, be unenforceable.
The argument also addressed the presumption that the scope of the statute might be too broad, since it makes it unlawful to have intercourse with young females who cannot become pregnant. Their opinion stated that the U.S. Constitution did not require the statute to limit its scope by excluding young girls;what is more, even if it did, the damage that very young girls can sustain from intercourse is reason enough to include them in the protection of the statute.
Finally, they determined that the statute was not unconstitutional because Michael M. was under 18 at the time of intercourse. The assumption by the statethat the male is the aggressor and therefore culpable at the time was seen as legitimate. They held that the state prevented illegitimate pregnancy by providing men a deterrent for such aggressive action. The age of the man was seen as irrelevant, since both young men and old are capable of inflicting damage.
Dissenting Opinion
A dissenting opinion by Justice Brennan stated that Rehnquist's opinion placed too much emphasis on California's goal of preventing teenage pregnancy andnot enough emphasis on whether the discrimination on the basis of sex was warranted and related to that goal. The dissenters argued that the state did notprovide enough evidence to establish the legitimacy of its goal (preventingteenage pregnancy), nor did it prove the relationship between the gender-based discrimination and that objective. They looked for California to provide evidence that there are fewer teenage pregnancies under the statutory rape lawthan there would be if the law were gender neutral, as well as evidence thatbecause it punishes only males, it more effectively deters underaged women from having sexual intercourse. The state did not provide that kind of evidence, and therefore the dissenting justices were not convinced.
The dissenting opinion also pointed out that at the time, there were 37 states which have gender-neutral statutory rape laws, and that California had revised other sections of the Penal Code to make them gender-neutral. They also stated that common sense dictates that gender-neutral laws are potentially greater deterrents for underage sexual activity, since it makes both men and women subject to criminal punishment, therefore impacting twice as many potential violators. Justice Stevens, in a separate dissent, suggested that there isno reason to exempt a woman from the scope of the law, when the woman is capable of using her own judgment of whether or not to assume the risk of sexualintercourse.
Implications
The Court's opinion is significant because it gives an extraordinary amount of weight to a state's after-the-fact assertion of the original reason it enacted the statute. Additionally, though the statute may not have been carefullydrawn at the outset, the Court determined that the resulting legal action was appropriate and legitimate. The overall legitimacy of the goal, and the relationship of the statute to that goal, rendered the sex-based classificationof the statute permissible.
This decision may raise questions on other equal-protection issues such as how one is able to determine whether or not men and women are "similarly situated" with respect to the aim of the law. The decision also raised questions regarding in what respect and to what extent, men and women are supposed to besimilarly situated for an appropriate gender-based classification to be made.These questions were not answered by the majority opinion and are thereforestill open to interpretation. Though in the past the Court has determined that, with regard to the Equal Protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, alegal classification must be reasonable in relation to the objectives of thelaw, this may be subject to differing opinions on what is "reasonable." The Court must be very careful in how it interprets this clause. The results of such interpretation could be inconsistent at best, and in fact "the Supreme Court has successively imposed different constitutional frameworks for reviewinglegislation that draws lines between the sexes."
Related Cases

• Kahn v. Shevin, 416 U.S. 351 (1974).
  
• Schlesinger v. Ballard, 419 U.S. 498 (1975).
  
• Craig v. Boren, 429 U.S. 190 (1976).

When the Rapist Isn't a Stranger
In the popular perception, rape is a crime most often between strangers: forinstance, a lone woman is walking down a dark alley, where she is accosted byan assailant she has never seen before and will never see again unless he iscaught.
This view, however pervasive it may be, is inaccurate, as has become clear through increasing societal awareness of date rape and acquaintance rape--not to mention Department of Justice statistics, which show that the majority of rape victims knew their assailants. One 1994 Justice Department study, for example, showed that of all types of crime studied, rape had the highest percentage of incidents involving non-strangers: 77 percent. By contrast, figures were as low as 18 percent for completed robbery without injury, meaning that in82 percent of all such crimes reported, the victim did not know the perpetrator.
Another Justice Department study offered some information on relationship ofvictims to the perpetrator. Though in a third of instances, the data showed only that the rapist was well-known to the victim without specifying relationship. Ten percent of rapes, according to this study, were committed by spouses, ex-spouses, or other relatives.
Sources
Bureau of Justice Statistics Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics--1996. Washington, DC: U.S. Government, 1997.