Governor Andy Beshear (D-KY)

Kentucky Supreme Court will consider Beshear’s COVID-19 orders in light of new laws

By Jack Brammer | April 16, 2021 | 11:08 AM | Updated: April 16, 2021 | 1:12 PM

The Kentucky Supreme Court has decided to take up two legal cases involving Gov. Andy Beshear’s powers to deal with the coronavirus pandemic and other emergencies and hear them at the same time June 10.

Supreme Court Chief Justice John D. Minton Jr. signed orders Thursday night for the state’s highest court to consider cases from Franklin and Scott circuit courts. He said a time for the June 10 hearing will be set later.

The Franklin case involves Attorney General Daniel Cameron’s appeal of Circuit Judge Phillip Shepherd’s decision to temporarily block four legislative measures the General Assembly enacted this year that curb Beshear’s emergency powers.

The Scott case involves Beshear’s appeal of Circuit Judge Brian Privett’s ruling to temporarily block the state from enforcing some of Beshear’s executive COVID-19 orders against several restaurants and breweries

There’s more at the original.

Note the date of the hearing: June 10^th. That’s eight weeks away, effectively another two months before the state Supreme Court will even hold oral arguments for and against the Governor’s executive orders and the laws passed by the state legislature to curtail them. A previous story in the Herald-Leader stated:

As of today, Kentucky is about 900,000 short of reaching the goal of 2.5 million vaccinated. More than 1.55 million Kentuckians have received their “first shot of hope,” said the governor.

With the current supply of the vaccine, Beshear said Kentucky could reach the 2.5 million goal in 3½ weeks, but said it most likely will be between four and six weeks.

So, if the guesstimates of four to six weeks are accurate, and if the Governor them lifts some, but not all, of his executive orders as promised, oral arguments eight weeks from now would make the case in Judge Privett’s case moot; and the Justices would almost certainly simply dismiss it.

But the Governor still wants that visible sign of subservience to his decrees:

Even with the easing of the restrictions, Beshear said, Kentuckians still will have to wear masks until there is more control of the virus. He also said he will address larger venues later.

We noted the previous pattern: Several lawsuits were filed in state courts to stop the Governor’s emergency decrees under KRS39A. On July 17, 2020, the state Supreme Court put a hold on all lower court orders against Mr Beshear’s orders and directed that “any lower court order, after entry, be immediately transferred to the clerk of the Supreme Court for consideration by the full court.” Three weeks later, the  Court set September 17, 2020, another five weeks later, to hear oral arguments by both sides.

The Court then waited for eight more weeks to issue its decision, until November 12, 2020, which upheld the Governor’s orders.

If the Kentucky Supreme Court, officially non-partisan but in practice controlled by the Democrats, follows the same pattern, a second eight week delay will mean a decision around the first week of August! Even if that decision supports the duly passed laws of the General Assembly, the state courts will have given the Governor half a year to exercise power that the General Assembly restricted.

Rights delayed are rights denied. But we will be lucky if our rights are only delayed; it isn’t difficult to picture the state Supreme Court coming up with some convoluted reasoning to invalidate the laws passed by the General Assembly. I can hope that the state legislature impeaches and removes our dictatorial Governor in the 2022 session, but, in reality, our best hope is for the voters to kick him to the curb in the 2023 election.