It is odd that you would use Korematsu as support for your position, but I believe it supports mine. At the time, the overwhelming majority of the public and the most liberal president up until that time supported interning Japanese-American citizens.
It has since been criticized as one of the top five worst Supreme Court decisions in history, possibly the third worst with only Dred Scott and Plessy worse than that. When people who viewed it with a clear eye, and not through panic saw it, they saw how horrible it was.
And it happened because people got scared in an emergency and suspended constitutional rights: exactly what is happening now.
It further matters not that legislatures have passed these laws. That is a pretty feeble argument as you know as well as I that no mere statute can supersede the Constitution. Also Lincoln did suspend Habeas Corpus, but the Constitution specifically allows it to be suspended in times of rebellion, so I’m not sure how that helps you.
As far as supporting these “emergencies” laws, I am surprised that you would do so. Those are what tinpot dictators use; countries are in perpetual emergencies. The United States still has the AUMF act passed on September 12, 2001 in force today. You should know from history that this stuff is never constrained for the moment and that is because every.single.problem that presents itself is the worst.thing.ever in the moment that it is happening.
The Constitution should not be subject to emergency suspensions.
The reason you are making a laughable argument is that you are using something unrelated to the question at hand, which is a straw man, to argue against the actual proposition.
Nobody is suggesting we shut down businesses because of drunk driving. But because nobody supports that, you are suggesting we should let a pandemic spread, because “SlIpPeRRrY Sl0pe!!”
That’s why your argument deserves to be laughed at. It’s criminally bad.
Further, (and I’m sorry for my double posts, but always forget something ) the founders knew how to make exceptions to rights.
Just like the habeas clause. They specifically said that in times of rebellion it could be suspended. They knew of plagues and disease. Why could they not have used a similar exception in the First Amendment? Free religion, unless a pandemic is present. Free assembly, unless a pandemic is present, etc.
It is not unrelated. Pandemics and drunk driving kill people. More disease spreads and more drunk driving incidents happen when you allow people freedom. Fewer disease will spread and fewer drunk driving incidents will happen if you cheat with or suspend Constitutional protections. Do you disagree with any of that?
If not, then how is it unrelated?
It is only unrelated if you put an asterisk around the Covid-19 pandemic and label it somehow “special” or distinct from drunk driving. But how would you propose to do that when the “special” condition is that it will kill a lot of people otherwise. You can make the same argument about drunk driving.
And, really, that’s what they did with drunk driving. Ronald Reagan, the states’ rights president, who stated forcefully that states should set their own internal policies, supported the national 21 year old drinking age because that exception was “special” in that it saved lives, by not having young people drive across borders in states with lower drinking ages and driving back home drunk. Everything becomes “special.”
Let me get this straight, counsellor. You are unable to distinguish between a viral pandemic and fatal traffic accidents?
Like, if you were put up on the stand, sworn in, and upon penalty of law – you would be unable to name any characteristics of one that is not shared by the other, therefore, to the best of your understanding, they are the same?
AFAIK pastors were busted for holding explicitly banned gatherings during a declared emergency. I would similarly be arrested for convening a dense assembly of atheists, socialists, or philatelists. Other sky pilots have managed to be pastoral online to avoid contagious crowds. Some perform video faith-healing without physical contact. ¡Milagro!
Does freedom of religion demand allowance of public ritual animal (or human) sacrifices?
The issue isn’t worship, but a known threat to public health. We may see a change of tone as more of the [del]scientifically illiterate[/del] holy are taken to their reward. They’re welcome to reach eternity on their own without taking my family along.
Of course they are different on their own facts; everything is different on its facts. But we should have neutral governing principles. I would say that traffic accidents cause fewer deaths than this pandemic, so one could argue that a “stay at home” order for drunk driving is excessive, but then we have only established the principle that the government can violate your rights on a sliding scale, proportioned to the threat, which if carried generally, would make these rights a joke because who wants to be the one to argue that DUI deaths just aren’t so bad?
Exactly. We’ve started down the slope already. Why not make it allowable to stop everyone at everytime and not just at checkpoints? Death will happen otherwise!
Your last paragraph sort of emphasizes your bias here. You don’t believe religion is important at all, so no skin off your back if it is banned entirely.
Yes, I agree that generally applicable laws apply to religion as well. You cannot have human sacrifice because that violates the generally applicable law of murder. Further, it regulates at the periphery of the right. You can believe what you want, go to whatever church you want, and pray to whomever/whatever you want: you just can’t human sacrifice.
But you would take it a step further and say that because all public gatherings, including religious gatherings are banned then no problem, right? But by doing so, you are striking at the core of the right. Free assembly is a right. Free exercise of religion is a right. These rights stand on their own. It would be an odd situation indeed if you could eviscerate the core of an enumerated right by disallowing a much greater amount of activity.
IOW, we would agree that if a law was passed that said nobody can assemble in churches that would be terribly unconstitutional. But if you say that nobody can assemble anywhere, including churches, isn’t that worse? But your argument says that it is better.
How? Just because the government does not have the subjective intent to target religion? Your rights are denied all the same.
The laws against public assemblies during the pandemic are “generally applicable laws” and they do not target religion. So why doesn’t your own test say the law applies without infringing constitutional right to assembly?
If there is a religion where human sacrifice is a key part of their beliefs, why can the law interfere with their free exercise of religion? They might say that going to their church and praying is peripheral to their religious beliefs; the core of their beliefs is human sacrifice, and if they do not carry out their god’s demands, their souls are doomed. And, if their rite of human sacrifice involves willing participants, why should the murder law get in the way? Why does the government get to decide what is the periphery of their religion, and therefore can be interfered with by a generally applicable law?
So you are saying that neutral governing principles should apply to different sets of facts. Like, homicide in self-defense should be treated like murder because of principles? After all, death results from both, so your neutral set of principles would send us down the slippery slope (which is real, says you) to sending victims of late-night home invasion robberies who successfully defend themselves to the gas chamber.
And by the way, how many governments have closed businesses jurisdiction-wide to enforce drunk driving laws? Which locale is going to be the first one to do that, in your estimation?
Because the generally applicable law targets the very core of the rights (free assembly and free religion) such that no generally applicable law should survive scrutiny. Could a law that bans all medical procedures on pregnant women survive as it doesn’t specifically target abortion?
We look at text, history, and tradition. The government certainly does not get to define what religion entails, but we look at what the free exercise of religion meant at the time of the founding. Whatever else it might mean, we could write law review articles about, but it certainly means going to your local church, and attending in person. It never meant, and does not mean, whatever ancillary practices outside of whatever the core of the right that was meant at the time of the founding (or in your case in Canada, what was meant at common law) must be permitted.
We are completely misunderstanding each other. Murder is murder. Self-defense is self-defense. That doesn’t change with the times even though death results from both. I guess I am confused by what you are asking.
Nobody has closed businesses down for DUI deaths. Again, maybe it is my fault that I don’t understand your question. What I am saying is that based upon the case of Raveman v. Ultravires, if you win this argument, in 2040 we can suspend constitutional rights, lets say to whatever is a reasonable extent, to prevent DUI deaths (or whatever other deaths) because of an emergency and temporary situation of increased drinking and driving.
Based on that “operating a motor vehicle on the public roads is a licensed privilege, not a right.”
However, back to the thread subject… I see nothing in the California rules and proposals that is inherently tyrannical. I just don’t.
OTOH I find it interesting that some people keep getting all bent out of shape at having to be temporarily inconvenienced and discomforted due to exigent circumstance, but not when it is detrimental to others. OTOH if it makes it possible for them to join in resisting ALL overreaches of government power and not just the ones that inconvenience them, who knows…
Murder is murder. Self-defense is self-defense. Pandemics are pandemics. Drunk driving is drunk driving. Each should be treated as what it is. The reason you are confused is that you are saying pandemics are like drunk driving in principle, if one ignores facts; but then murder isn’t like self-defense because you can’t ignore the facts. This is nonsense.
As for 2, that’s more slippery slope straw man nonsense. Nobody but you are saying that a viral pandemic, in which incompetence at the top levels of the government caused a massive failure of the public health response system, resulting in a last ditch Hail Mary policy of closing down businesses, has the slightest resemblance to drunk driving. It’s an absurd comparison.
Furthermore, you have the roles of plaintiff and defendant reversed. You are the one saying there will be the legal authority to shut down society for drunk driving, and I will be the one saying there is not.
I said nothing of the sort. Freedom of and from religion are equally vital. If your religion demands you assemble with a contagious crowd of scientifically illiterates, go for it. In quarantine. Because “free expression” of your religion does not empower you to infect me or others, just as your religion does not empower you to sacrifice Bolivian dwarves with a jagged, rusty knife. Or does it?
We have the right peaceably to assemble. Up to the legal capacity of an elevator or room. You’ve likely seen such notices. Or until the sheriff declares an assembly to be unlawful, or a landowner tells a crowd to quit trespassing on their property. You may have heard such words. Or until a truck doesn’t stop on the highway offramp a mob is trying to block. Oops. Or until a limited emergency declaration drafted under applicable law says “Shelter In Place.” You don’t like emergency decrees? Tell a judge.
Did you actually claim to be an attorney or do I misremember?
Please cite a US law prohibiting church gatherings.* And go ahead, assemble anywhere, like the places I mentioned. See what happens.
Meanwhile, here’s what that commie rag REASON says on the subject:
Certain religious practices are outlawed in the US, mostly re: Native Americans, Mormons, and child abuse. (cite)
How would this work exactly? 200 to 300 cars lined up for a mile or so, each one getting an individual religious service(music optional, I guess)-shouldn’t take more than a day a half, right?
) the founders knew how to make exceptions to rights.