MONTGOMERY, Ala. – “Public morality can still serve as a legitimate rational basis for regulating commercial activity, which is not a private activity,” the Alabama Supreme Court ruled Friday in upholding a state law that prohibits the sale of sex toys except in demonstrable medical or educational contexts.The case, heard on appeal from Ross Winner and his Hoover, Ala.-based Love Stuff store, challenged the constitutionality of a portion of Alabama’s anti-obscenity law. Under the law, Winner may sell sex toys, but they must be stocked in a private room to which entry is granted only after a store employee verifies a customer’s age by viewing a valid ID and only if the customer can prove he or she “fits medical or educational criteria.”

In their ruling, the justices relied on a 2004 decision by the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Williams v. Attorney General of Alabama. That case, which attempted to enjoin the same section of the anti-obscenity law for similar reasons — constitutional vagueness and violation of privacy — also went against the appellant.

“There is nothing ‘private’ or ‘consensual’ about the advertising and sale of a dildo,” the 11th Circuit panel ruled.

“We feel a person should have the ability to come in and purchase a sexual device with out having to have a reason,” Winner told the Birmingham CBS News affiliate. “Something as personal as enhancing your relationship with your wife and to create a strong loving relationship with your wife is nobody’s business. It’s nobody’s concern what you do in the privacy of your bedroom. The government does not have the right to have input on that.”

He also said he’s “weighing the pros and cons to decide if it’s really worth his time and money” to appeal the decision to the U.S. Supreme Court, local CBS reporter Kimberly Rankin noted.

Evidently at least some citizens of Birmingham are on Winner’s side.

“I do believe that all women and men have the right to purchase what they want to use in the privacy of their own homes at any given time,” Lorraine Carty told the television news crew.

“It’s your bedroom; you pay rent there,” Shanice King told CBS. “The government doesn’t help you out whatsoever. They already invade our privacy enough as it is, so invading the bedroom is taking everything away from us, and we might as well be living in a communist country.”