Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/19pdf/17-1618_hfci.pdf
Page Number: 66

Cite as:  590 U. S. ____ (2020) 

29 

ALITO, J., dissenting 

In its then-most recent Diagnostic and Statistical Manual
of Mental Disorders (1952) (DSM–I), the American Psychi-
atric Association (APA) classified same-sex attraction as a
“sexual deviation,” a particular type of “sociopathic person-
ality  disturbance,”  id.,  at  38–39,  and  the  next  edition,  is-
sued in 1968, similarly classified homosexuality as a “sex-
ual  deviatio[n],”  Diagnostic  and  Statistical  Manual  of 
Mental Disorders 44 (2d ed.) (DSM–II).  It was not until the 
sixth  printing  of  the  DSM–II  in  1973  that  this  was
changed.23 

Society’s  treatment  of  homosexuality  and  homosexual 
conduct was consistent with this understanding.  Sodomy
was  a  crime  in  every  State  but  Illinois,  see  W.  Eskridge, 
Dishonorable Passions 387–407 (2008), and in the District 
of Columbia, a law enacted by Congress made sodomy a fel-
ony punishable by imprisonment for up to 10 years and per-
mitted  the  indefinite  civil  commitment  of  “sexual  psycho-
path[s],”  Act of June 9, 1948, §§104, 201–207, 62 Stat. 347– 
349.24 

—————— 

23 APA, Homosexuality and Sexual Orientation Disturbance: Proposed 
Change in DSM–II, 6th Printing, p. 44 (APA Doc. Ref. No. 730008, 1973) 
(reclassifying “homosexuality” as a “[s]exual orientation disturbance,” a
category “for individuals whose sexual interests are directed primarily 
toward  people  of  the  same  sex  and  who  are  either  disturbed  by  . . .  or 
wish to change their sexual orientation,” and explaining that “homosex-
uality . . . by itself does not constitute a psychiatric disorder”); see also
APA, Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders 281–282 (3d 
ed. 1980) (DSM–III) (similarly creating category of “Ego-dystonic Homo-
sexuality” for “homosexuals  for whom changing sexual orientation is a 
persistent concern,” while observing that “homosexuality itself is not con-
sidered  a  mental  disorder”);  Obergefell  v.  Hodges,  576  U. S.  644,  661 
(2015). 

24 In 1981, after achieving home rule, the District attempted to decrim-
inalize sodomy, see D. C. Act No. 4–69, but the House of Representatives
vetoed the bill, H. Res. 208, 97th Cong., 1st Sess. (1981); 127 Cong. Rec. 
22764–22779 (1981).  Sodomy was not decriminalized in the District un-
til 1995.  See Anti-Sexual Abuse Act of 1994, §501(b), 41 D. C. Reg. 53 
(1995), enacted as D. C. Law 10–257.