11-18-2018, 01:47 PM
Quote:Once upon a time, when he was but a mere solicitor general for the state of Texas, Ted Cruz helped write a 76-page legal brief defending the Lone Star State’s ban on the sale of sex toys. While his argument was ultimately shot down by an appellate court, the brief resurfaced Wednesday, confronting Americans with an unfortunate juxtaposition of mental images. Mother Jones got its hands on the 2007 brief for the case, in which Cruz was tasked with defending a state law banning the sale and advertisement of sex toys—or “obscene devices,” as he called them—an offense then punishable by up to two years in jail.Ted Cruz Doesn’t Believe You Have the Right to Masturbate | Vanity Fair
In its brief to the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, Cruz and his team argued that the plaintiffs challenging the law, a group of online retailers and Austin stores that sold sex toys, were not protected under the 14th Amendment’s right to privacy. In fact, he continued, banning obscene devices was in the public interest, and the government should be granted “police powers” for the purposes of “discouraging prurient interests in sexual gratification, combating the commercial sale of sex, and protecting minors.” Furthermore, using “obscene devices,” the state argued, was akin to “hiring a willing prostitute or engaging in consensual bigamy.””