Pirate's Cove

Let’s not forget, the Constitution is really laying out what the specific duties of  the federal government are, and why lines they may not cross. The 1st Amendment lays out more of what the Government may not do. There was no exception because people were eating bats in a wet market in China (or, more likely, screwing around with diseases in a poorly secured facility)

Cuomo Attacks Supreme Court, but Virus Ruling Is Warning to Governors

As the coronavirus pandemic has deepened and darkened in recent months, the nation’s governors have taken increasingly aggressive steps to curb the current surge of infections, with renewed and expanded restrictions reaching into people’s homes, businesses, schools and places of worship.

Many of these rules, often enacted by Democratic officials and enforced through curfews, closures and capacity limits, have been resisted by some members of the public, but largely upheld by the courts.

Late Wednesday night, though, the U.S. Supreme Court forcefully entered the arena, signaling that it was willing to impose new constraints on executive and emergency orders during the pandemic, at least where constitutional rights are affected.

In a 5-4 decision, the court struck down an order by Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo that had restricted the size of religious gatherings in certain areas of New York where infection rates were climbing. The governor had imposed 10- and 25-person capacity limits on churches and other houses of worship in those areas.

New restraints? No. Old freedoms for The People.

The decision seemed to signal that some governmental efforts to stem the pandemic had overreached, impinging on protected freedoms in the name of public health. If unconstrained religious observance and public safety were sometimes at odds, as the governor and other public officials maintained, the court ruled that religious freedom should win out.

As it should be. The federal Constitution and NY state constitution do not discuss saving people from making bad decisions. Even decisions that could lead to their deaths. We don’t stop them from climbing mountains or smoking or drinking (well, have to be of age for last two). We don’t make them have some sort of contraption to keep them from falling while taking a shower. I bet you’re thinking of lots of examples right now. We do stop the Government from interfering with our 1st Amendment Rights, though.

Mr. Cuomo accused the court of partisanship, suggesting the ruling reflected the influence of the three conservative justices who have been nominated by President Trump in the past four years.

“You have a different court, and I think that was the statement that the court was making,” Mr. Cuomo, a third-term Democrat, said on Thursday. “We know who he appointed to the court. We know their ideology.”

Hey, everyone’s entitled to their own opinion. Perhaps, though, Cuomo should take a gander at his own Constitution (though, the Progressives did manage to modify Article I Section 3 to perhaps allow these offenses against religion).

Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. noted in a dissenting opinion that none of the governor’s most strict restrictions were currently in force. While the governor’s capacity limits on houses of worship might have violated the First Amendment, Justice Roberts wrote that it was not necessary for the court “to rule on that serious and difficult question at this time.”

“The Governor might reinstate the restrictions. But he also might not,” Justice Roberts wrote, saying it is “a significant matter to override determinations made by public health officials.”

But of course Roberts took this road. One of the worst picks for the court by a Republican ever. A real Conservative would have backstopped the Rights of citizens 100%

Critics of the court’s decision contended that Mr. Cuomo’s actions had not infringed on religious freedom and that the Supreme Court’s ruling could have dangerous public health consequences.

“The freedom to worship is one of our most cherished fundamental rights, but it does not include a license to harm others or endanger public health,” said Daniel Mach, the director for the American Civil Liberties Union’s freedom of religion and belief program.

Actually, it does. Because, let’s say I have chicken pox as a kid, and you decide to be near me to get it so that you will become immune, that’s on us. The Bill of Rights doesn’t give Government permission to abrogate our Rights for Reasons.

Rabbi Chaim Dovid Zwiebel, executive vice president of Agudath Israel of America, an ultra-Orthodox umbrella group which had also sued to overturn the rules, called the decision historic, saying it “will ensure that religious practices and religious institutions will be protected from government edicts.”

Exactly. I’m betting the Court might have been a little more caring of Cuomo’s point of view had he not allowed all the violent protests and such.

Read: NY Times: Why, Yes, The Supreme Court’s Decision Does Put The First Amendment First »