Louisiana judge blocked nationwide COVID-19 vaccine mandate for health care workers; Justice Barrett may have tipped SCOTUS hand
William F. Maddock
Conservative Brief reports that Justice Amy Coney Barrett might have tipped the Supreme Court’s hand in asking a question during the oral argument portion of the Dobbs v. Jackson case.
Conservative Brief reports that the Justice stated, in part, “Ms. [Senior Director of the Center for Reproductive Rights, Julie] Rickelman, I have a question about the Safe Haven laws. Petitioner points out that in all 50 states, you can terminate parental rights by relinquishing a child after abortion. And I think the shortest period might have been 48 hours if I’m remembering the data correctly. So it seems to me, seen in that light, both Roe and Casey emphasize the burdens of parenting and insofar as you and many of your amici focus on the ways in which the forced parenting, forced motherhood would hinder women’s access to the workplace and to equal opportunities, it’s also focused on the consequences of parenting and the obligations of motherhood that flow from pregnancy. Why don’t the Safe Haven laws take care of that problem? It seems to me that it focuses the burden much more narrowly. There is without question an infringement on bodily autonomy, which we have in other contexts like vaccines. However, it doesn’t seem to me to follow that pregnancy and then parenthood are all part of the same burden. And so it seems to me that the choice for focus would be between, say, the ability to get an abortion at 23 weeks or the state requiring the woman to go 15, 16 weeks more and then terminate parental rights at the conclusion. Why don’t you address the safe haven laws and why don’t they matter?”
Conservative Brief reports “Days ago, a federal judge blocked Joe Biden’s vaccine mandate for health care workers, issuing a nationwide injunction on the president’s order.
“‘Louisiana Western District U.S. Judge Terry Doughty’s decision follows an identical ruling Monday from Missouri U.S. District Judge Matthew Schelp, but Schelp’s decision only covered 10 states,’ The Daily Advertiser reported.”
The Daily Advertiser article, though, is dated November 30, 2021, and last updated December 1, 2021.
In its article, written by Greg Hilburn, the Daily Advertiser quoted Louisiana Western District U.S. Judge Terry Doughty as writing, in issuing a nationwide injunction against Joseph Biden’s healthcare worker vaccine mandate, “If the executive branch is allowed to usurp the power of the legislative branch to make laws, two of the three powers conferred by our Constitution would be in the same hands. If human nature and history teach anything, it is that civil liberties face grave risks when governments proclaim indefinite states of emergency. During a pandemic such as this one, it is even more important to safeguard the separation of powers set forth in our Constitution to avoid erosion of our liberties. [This case] will ultimately be decided by a higher court than this one. However, it is important to preserve the status quo in this case. The liberty interests of the unvaccinated [require] nothing less.”
Some might question the bodily autonomy issue, here (whether it requires abortion to be a viable option), but in my opinion that is a false premise. Pregnancy is not an invasion of bodily autonomy by a wholly outside force, but is a consequence of prior actions engaged in by the host. Even in the case of forced action the baby is the result and not the miscreant and does not deserve the death penalty for something it did not do.
