ABSTRACT
Griswold v. Connecticut, decided in 1965, formally established the constitutional right to privacy. The case became even more important constitutionally when it became the precedent for the famous Roe v. Wade, the case that legalized abortion in the United States. Even though elements of the right to privacy had received constitutional recognition dating to the early days of the republic, there was no general right to privacy in US law prior to Griswold. Griswold involved an 1879 Connecticut law that forbade the use of contraceptive devices to prevent conception or give information about their use. The impact of Griswold in Connecticut in 1965 was extremely minimal due to the nonenforcement of the law it overruled, but the right-to-privacy principle it established became crucial to both sides in the bitter debates over abortion that followed since Roe v. Wade was decided.
