acroyear | not ready for marriage but need to live (together) in NC

N.C. law banning cohabitation struck down - Yahoo! News:

RALEIGH, N.C. - A state judge has ruled that North Carolina's 201-year-old law barring unmarried couples from living together is unconstitutional.

The American Civil Liberties Union sued last year to overturn the rarely enforced law on behalf of a former sheriff's dispatcher who says she had to quit her job because she wouldn't marry her live-in boyfriend.

Deborah Hobbs, 41, says her boss, Sheriff Carson Smith of Pender County, near Wilmington, told her to get married, move out or find another job after he found out she and her boyfriend had been living together for three years. The couple did not want to get married, so Hobbs quit in 2004.

State Superior Court Judge Benjamin Alford issued the ruling late Wednesday, saying the law violated Hobbs' constitutional right to liberty. He cited a 2003 Supreme Court ruling that struck down a Texas sodomy law.

Of course, there still are a few other ancient and useless laws still sitting in NC's books...

Hobbs probably won't get that particular job back because there's clauses in the county that the Sheriff can terminate employment for any reason, and why go back to someone you know despises your lifestyle - the work simply won't be worth it...