The number of degree days applied to any particular day of the week is determined by calculating the mean temperature for the day and then comparing the mean temperature to a base value of 65 degrees F. (The mean temperature is calculated by adding together the high for the day and the low for the day, and then dividing the result by 2.)
Carrie E. Garrow is a member of the St. Regis Mohawk Tribe. She is a visiting assistant professor at Syracuse University College of Law and the Chief Appellate Judge for the St. Regis Mohawk Tribal Court. She also is a judicial consultant and currently works for Tribal Law and Policy Institute.
Doctors had tried challenging the law more than once. None of those cases made it to the Supreme Court, usually for procedural reasons, but in 1965 the Supreme Court decided Griswold v. Connecticut, which helped define the right to privacy under the Constitution. Connecticut was not the only state with laws against birth control. The issue was important to women across the nation. Margaret Sanger, who had worked tirelessly throughout her life to educate women and advocate birth control, died in 1966, the year after Griswold v. Connecticut was decided.