Behind Closed Doors: Impotence Trials and the Trans-Historical Right to Marital Privacy

Behind Closed Doors: Impotence Trials and the Trans-Historical Right to Marital Privacy
Stephanie B. Hoffman, 89 B.U. L. Rev. 1725 (2009)

Part III analyzes the role that impotence trials play in challenging traditional conceptions of marital privacy. The impotence trial represents what today is an inherently suspect action by the court: an investigation of the marital bedroom. Trans-historical accounts consistently protect the marital bedroom from government or judicial oversight. However, the impotence trial did not just peek into the marital bedroom; it threw the curtain wide open. And the subsequent popular publications invited the public in for a full viewing.