California Gay-Conversion Therapy Ban Upheld by Appeal Court
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California’s first-in-the-nation law barring licensed therapists from counseling minors to change their sexual orientation from gay to straight was upheld by a federal appeals court.
State lawmakers acted reasonably in limiting a treatment that health groups found to be harmful to minors, a unanimous three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals in San Francisco said in an opinion published today. Protecting the well-being of children is a legitimate state interest, and the law “does not violate the free speech rights of practitioners or minor patients, is neither vague nor overbroad, and does not violate parents’ fundamental rights,” the court said.