Michael M. v. Superior Court of Sonoma County
United States Supreme Court
450 U.S. 464 (1981)
California defined statutory rape as intercourse with a female under 18 who is not the perpetrator's wife, meaning only males could be charged and only females could be victims. Michael M. (defendant), a 17-year-old, was charged under the law for having intercourse with a 16-year-old female and challenged the statute as violating the Equal Protection Clause because it discriminated based on sex. The California Supreme Court agreed the law discriminated on the basis of sex but upheld it as justified by the state's compelling interest in preventing illegitimate teen pregnancies, and the U.S. Supreme Court granted certiorari.
Whether a state statutory-rape law that can be violated only by males, and not females, violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.