ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO, in Jacobson v Massachusetts, the US Supreme Court upheld the Cambridge, Mass, Board of Health’s authority to require vaccination against smallpox during a smallpox epidemic. Jacobson was one of the few Supreme Court cases before 1960 in which a citizen challenged the state’s authority to impose mandatory restrictions on personal liberty for public health purposes. What might such a case teach us today? First, it raises timeless questions about the power of state government to take specific action to protect the public’s health and the Constitution’s protection of personal liberty. What limits state power? What does constitutionally protected liberty include? Second, answers to these questions can change as scientific knowledge, social institutions, and constitutional jurisprudence progress. A comparison of answers to these questions 100 years ago and today shows how public health and constitutional law have evolved to better protect both health and human rights.
Jacobson was decided in 1905, when infectious diseases were the leading cause of death and public health programs were organized primarily at the state and community levels. The federal government had comparatively little involvement in health matters, other than preventing ships from bringing diseases such as yellow fever into the nation’s ports. Few weapons existed to combat epidemics. There was no Food and Drug Administration (FDA), no regulation of research, and no doctrine of informed consent. The Flexner Report was 5 years in the future, medicine would have little to offer until sulfonamides were developed in the 1930s, and most vaccines would not be available for almost half a century. Hospitals were only beginning to take their modern form, and people who had mental illnesses were often shut away in asylums.
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An interesting dilemma concerning state mandated vaccinations to prevent COVID-19. If you refuse a vaccine, the STATE may physically make you comply. I doubt the synopsis above that settled this case law based on a polio epidemic would have envisioned a time where profits are more important than “curing” a disease.
Could you imagine arguing this case in 1905? Would the court understand that the epidemic in this country was part of a worldwide pandemic caused by the release of a genetically engineered virus? Would they consider that the US government helped sponsor the research that created the virus? How would the court take into consideration that medicine today is more about enslaving the people with high medical insurance run by the government than curing disease? How would they consider the consequences of a protein based vaccine that has side effects with a 30% CFR if the virus mutates?
OR do you really think the courts care about the people in a two-tiered justice system?
David DeGerolamo
My Mother lined us up for that Polio vaccine in the early 60’s. They since declassified those documents. As I recall 1/2 of the doses were laced with cancer cells. A friend of mine asked my mother to take her with us. Ended up with a tumor at the injection site. Almost lost her arm. I stopped lining up for vaccines a long time ago. The only prescription drug I would take if needed would be an antibiotic. I’m getting ready to turn 72.
30% CFR… is this a theoretical question, or has this happened? Can you let me know where this stat came from? I have been searching all morning and the search engines seem to be unwilling to lead me in the right direction… I wonder why (sarc)… thanks.
I think this was in one of the early Chris Martenson’s video. References to the secondary pathway immune infection, cytokine storm or its timeframe have been scrubbed for the most part.
Don’t line up! Make the controllers line up for lead injections!
If the Fourth Amendment’s guarantee of security in our persons doesn’t forbid this, then it (along with the entire notion of Constitutionally guaranteed rights) is MEANINGLESS.
The constitution has been meaningless in practice for a long time. People would be more than justified to engage in revolt at any time, over a myriad of issues.
That’s the Truth Matt