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Vanity: constitutional issues people site to disobey the “shelter in place” order.
Facebook | April 18, 2020 | Vanity

Posted on 04/18/2020 7:09:09 PM PDT by where's_the_Outrage?

Thought this was worth sharing! Found it on a friends FB feed:

My friend who is a lawyer in Michigan posted this. It addresses constitutional issues people site to disobey the “shelter in place” order.

“Liberty gives you the right to act the fool if you so choose; it does not, however, give you the right to do so at the expense of others.” -A sentence I jotted in my Constitutional Law class notes one day in 2009.

Because so many of us are focused on the ill-advised and outright dangerous protest against Michigan’s “stay home, stay safe” order that occurred in Lansing today, it seems like a good time for a quick constitutional law lesson. Too many people seem to rely on a soundbite version of the Constitution to decide how they, personally, think it should be interpreted. The words “liberty” and “freedom” are casually tossed about, not as a shield of protection but as a weapon to excuse the inexcusable.

The question of whether a state or local government, when responding to an emergency like a natural disaster, an epidemic, or war, may take extraordinary measures that temporarily curtail many of the freedoms—like those of movement/travel and assembly that are most at issue right now—that we as Americans are accustomed to is not a new one. In fact, quite the contrary is true.

Again and again, the courts have addressed the issue and recognized that, yes, in an emergency the states and/or their subdivisions may take actions that in normal circumstances would not be allowed. Think back to, say, World War II. Would it be acceptable for an individual living in a coastal city to leave all of his windows uncovered and turn on every light in his house during an air raid blackout? Or would you expect such a person to be punished? The Supreme Court has, in fact, repeatedly rejected the idea that one person’s "liberty" trumps the safety and well-being of the community. In Jacobson v. Massachusetts, a 1905 case in which the Court upheld a compulsory smallpox vaccination law, Justice John Marshall Harlan explained in his opinion for the Court that “the liberty secured by the Constitution of the United States to every person within its jurisdiction does not import an absolute right in each person to be, at all times and in all circumstances, wholly freed from restraint. There are manifold restraints to which every person is necessarily subject for the common good. On any other basis organized society could not exist with safety to its members. Society based on the rule that each one is a law unto himself would soon be confronted with disorder and anarchy. Real liberty for all could not exist under the operation of a principle which recognizes the right of each individual person to use his own, whether in respect of his person or his property, regardless of the injury that may be done to others.” Jacobson v. Massachusetts, 197 US 11, 26 (1905).

Justice Harlan’s words in Jacobson echoed the Court’s decision from 15 years earlier in Crowley v. Christensen, in which the Court stated that “the possession and enjoyment of all rights are subject to such reasonable conditions as may be deemed by the governing authority of the country essential to the safety, health, peace, good order and morals of the community. Even liberty itself, the greatest of all rights, is not unrestricted license to act according to one's own will. It is only freedom from restraint under conditions essential to the equal enjoyment of the same right by others. It is then liberty regulated by law.” Crowley v. Christensen, 137 US 86, 89–90 (1890). Later decisions of the Court have not deviated from these commonsense rulings: “There can be little doubt that in the exercise of its police power a State may confine individuals solely to protect society from the dangers of significant antisocial acts or communicable disease.” O’Connor v Donaldson, 422 US 563, 582–583 (1975).

The next time you hear someone complaining that our “freedom” and “liberty” are being “stolen” or that our governor or another is somehow a modern incarnation of a murderous fascist dictator for taking action to protect *all* of us, please know: they’re wrong. Is all of this inconvenient? Yes. Is it economically devastating? Undoubtedly. But is it unconstitutional? Under current circumstances, absolutely not. Our governor, and (most) others, recognize a simple but inescapable truth: you can recover from economic ruin, but you can’t bring back the dead. Their actions, informed by experts in communicable disease and public health, are based on the fundamental, core principle that animates our Constitution: the well-being of “We the People.”

So please, buck up. Stay home, stay safe, and stay healthy. The better we do at those three things right now, the sooner “stay home” won’t be necessary.


TOPICS: Government; Health/Medicine; Society
KEYWORDS: coronavanity; coronavirus; lockdown; michigan; quarantine; sitecitesight
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Making the rounds on facebook. Thoughts?
1 posted on 04/18/2020 7:09:09 PM PDT by where's_the_Outrage?
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To: where's_the_Outrage?

Cite.


2 posted on 04/18/2020 7:13:41 PM PDT by Larry Lucido
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To: where's_the_Outrage?

Grammar NAZI gripe: you mean “CIte”.


3 posted on 04/18/2020 7:13:58 PM PDT by the OlLine Rebel (Common sense is an uncommon virtue./Federal-run medical care is as good as state-run DMVs)
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To: where's_the_Outrage?

Got bored 2 paragraphs in :) I have a short attention span.

It ain’t the black death man.

And most have been in for a month.

Those who sacrifice freedom for security end up with neither.

or something like that :)


4 posted on 04/18/2020 7:14:09 PM PDT by dp0622 (Radicals, racists dont point fingers at me I'm a small town white boy Just tryin to make ends meet)
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To: where's_the_Outrage?

Your governor is the worst. Her orders are not about safety, but control. Can buy lottery tickets but not paint? Can’t go to a second home? Not logical.


5 posted on 04/18/2020 7:15:06 PM PDT by DLfromthedesert
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To: where's_the_Outrage?

A lot of course cases are going to be filed over selective enforcement.


6 posted on 04/18/2020 7:16:14 PM PDT by CheshireTheCat ("Forgetting pain is convenient.Remembering it agonizing.But recovering truth is worth the suffering")
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To: where's_the_Outrage?

There are a million reasons people can find to assert the Constitution doesn’t really mean what it says. Those reasons are all bull***t. And the people who propose them are either tyrants or slaves.


7 posted on 04/18/2020 7:17:24 PM PDT by Charles H. (The_r0nin) (Hwaet! Lar bith maest hord, sothlice!)
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To: where's_the_Outrage?

I appreciate your effort to post douchebaggery just so we can comment on it, but if all the douchebaggery on Facebook were posted here, there would be no room for anything else.


8 posted on 04/18/2020 7:17:28 PM PDT by PlateOfShrimp (c)
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To: where's_the_Outrage?

It’s not so much social distancing that has people up at arms, but instant laws like you cant buy seeds to plant your yearly garden because food in a food crisis is not as important as aborting babies and buying pot in state state marijuana stores that ARE ruled “essential”.

So the Constitutional viewpoint that this is about protecting people is a strawman argument at best.

Candy coating a turd shows intent...


9 posted on 04/18/2020 7:18:02 PM PDT by American in Israel (A wise man's heart directs him to the right, but the foolish mans heart directs him toward the left.)
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To: dp0622

Look up your Barry Goldwater.


10 posted on 04/18/2020 7:18:22 PM PDT by eyedigress (I don't need Navy Commanders freaking out. Weak)
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To: where's_the_Outrage?

SIC SEMPER TYRANNIS


11 posted on 04/18/2020 7:19:25 PM PDT by wastedyears (The left would kill every single one of us and our families if they knew they could get away with it)
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To: CheshireTheCat

While there may have been a justification initially, we have seen that the numbers just don’t add up for continuing this lockdown - ill and people who are at risk should be kept in but the arbitrary and draconian decrees have no justification.

TITLE 18, U.S.C., SECTION 242

Whoever, under color of any law, statute, ordinance, regulation, or custom, willfully subjects any person in any State, Territory, Commonwealth, Possession, or District to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured or protected by the Constitution or laws of the United States, ... shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than one year, or both; and if bodily injury results from the acts committed in violation of this section or if such acts include the use, attempted use, or threatened use of a dangerous weapon, explosives, or fire, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both; and if death results from the acts committed in violation of this section or if such acts include kidnaping or an attempt to kidnap, aggravated sexual abuse, or an attempt to commit aggravated sexual abuse, or an attempt to kill, shall be fined under this title, or imprisoned for any term of years or for life, or both, or may be sentenced to death.


12 posted on 04/18/2020 7:20:41 PM PDT by JMS
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To: where's_the_Outrage?

I appreciate your effort to post douchebaggery just so we can comment on it, but if all the douchebaggery on Facebook were posted here, there would be no room for anything else.


13 posted on 04/18/2020 7:22:33 PM PDT by PlateOfShrimp (c)
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To: where's_the_Outrage?

The First Amendment prohibits the government from infringing freedom of religion, freedom of peaceful assembly.

What else is needed?

Crying FIRE in a crowded theater is used as the excuse. But when one crise fire in a theater, you don’t shut down all theaters and all religious services over an incident in one.


14 posted on 04/18/2020 7:22:34 PM PDT by spintreebob
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To: PlateOfShrimp

oops. sorry, double post


15 posted on 04/18/2020 7:23:25 PM PDT by PlateOfShrimp (c)
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To: where's_the_Outrage?

Anyone who thinks people can come back from economic ruin and insane

Small businesses may not be able to make it back. Some big businesses will not make it back

This is NOT the same as small pox. This capriciousness ought to be tested in the courts. Liquor stores and pot dispensaries allowed to stay open but churches are outlawed??? Let’s see how that flies

By the way during smallpox outbreaks the country was never shut down. Those found to be sick were quarantined


16 posted on 04/18/2020 7:24:25 PM PDT by Nifster (I see puppy dogs in the clouds)
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To: where's_the_Outrage?

Many here on FR need to read and heed. I’m disappointed regarding how many “Fair Weather Patriots” are on this site. They would be dangerous if true hardship were to befall this Nation.


17 posted on 04/18/2020 7:24:27 PM PDT by GingisK
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To: where's_the_Outrage?
My initial reaction is simple:

It is preposterous for a governor or mayor to restrict travel in public places for "safety" reasons ... while at the same time allowing many types of business establishments -- where people gather much more closely than they do outdoors -- to remain open.

Go back and check out the decision by the Federal judge in Kentucky when he issued a restraining order against the governor who wanted to shut down Easter Sunday religious services. It's a great education in constitutional matters as they relate to your post here.

After reading that judge's decision, one thing became very clear to me: No government restrictions during this viral outbreak are likely to stand up to constitutional scrutiny as long as the same government issuing those restrictions is also allowing something as non-essential as LIQUOR STORES to conduct business.

18 posted on 04/18/2020 7:24:39 PM PDT by Alberta's Child ("And somewhere in the darkness ... the gambler, he broke even.")
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To: where's_the_Outrage?

25 days under ‘stay home’ order and 35 deaths - mainly in nursing homes and other care facilities.

85k unemployed in a State with 625k population (no state workers have been let go).

Our Looney-tune legislature hasn’t stopped working on devising new ways to tax us - namely from a new devastating carbon tax. Our state is ruined for the next decade.

I don’t care what any attorney has to say about this subject. He/she or It can hide in the basement.


19 posted on 04/18/2020 7:25:45 PM PDT by GreyHoundSailor
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To: dp0622
Those who sacrifice freedom for security end up with neither.

I know you are confused with the subtle differences between oppression and pandemics.

20 posted on 04/18/2020 7:26:06 PM PDT by GingisK
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