Tag Archives: #FreedomofAssembly

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Once again, Kentuckians have to go to the federal courts to protect their constitutional rights

As we have previously noted, the Kentucky state Supreme Court sided with Governor Andy Beshear (D-KY) and agreed that he did have the authority to declare a state of emergency and issue his COVID-19 executive orders. The General Assembly, in which Republicans will have veto-proof margins in the coming session, appears to be ready to limit the Governor’s authority under Kentucky Revised Statutes section 39A, but such action cannot occur before January.

But if the state courts are now foreclosed to challenging the Governor’s actions, the federal courts are not, and two federal judges, in separate cases, granted injunctions prohibiting the Governor from “enforcing the prohibition on mass gatherings with respect to any in-person religious service which adheres to applicable social distancing and hygiene guidelines.” A three-judge panel of the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals issued a similar ruling.

The rulings came just two weeks before the Governor was going to graciously allow churches to reopen anyway.

But the Governor has now issued new executive orders:

  • All public and private K-12 schools will close to in-person instruction starting November 23, through the end of the semester. The only exception is for elementary schools in counties outside the red zone, which may reopen on December 7 if the school follows all guidelines.

Beginning on November 20 and lasting until December 13:

  • All restaurants and bars will close to indoor dining services. Outdoor dining is still allowed, with some limitations.
  • Gyms are limited to 33% capacity, and no group classes or indoor games are allowed. Masks are required.
  • Indoor gatherings should be limited to two families, not exceeding a total of eight people.
  • Attendance at wedding and funerals is limited to 25 people.

So it’s back to the federal courts. From the Lexington Herald-leader:

4 Lexington Christian schools, 5 others in Ky. back lawsuit against Beshear closings

By Valerie Honeycutt Spears | November 23, 2020 | 07:11 AM EST | Updated: 10:27 AM EST

Nine Kentucky Christian schools, including Lexington Christian Academy and three others in Fayette County, filed a brief Sunday night in support of a federal lawsuit against Gov. Andy Beshear‘s order stopping in-person instruction at public and private K-12 schools.

“No evidence whatsoever has linked any current increase in COVID cases to numbers in schools,” said the brief filed in U.S. District Court in Frankfort. Amicus briefs, as they are called, are often filed by those affected by court cases to which they are not parties.

“Because the religious schools believe both in the importance of their mission and the need for in-person instruction to the greatest extent possible, each of the religious schools has taken extraordinary steps and incurred significant financial expense to provide safe in-person learning during this academic year, “ the brief said.

Nevertheless, Beshear added new COVID-19 restrictions last week after the Kentucky Supreme Court ruled earlier this month that he can to protect the health and safety of Kentucky citizens.

Despite that ruling, Danville Christian Academy and Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron on Friday filed a federal lawsuit against Beshear, arguing that his order closing Kentucky’s schools, including private religious schools, violates the First Amendment of the Constitution and the state’s Religious Freedom and Restoration Act.

There’s more at the original.

Given Mr Beshear’s penchant for filing lawsuits to try to frustrate Governor Matt Bevin (R-KY) when Mr Beshear was state Attorney General, there’s some delicious schadenfreude that a Republican Attorney General is paying the Governor back in kind.

The obvious question is: how long will it take for these lawsuits to be resolved? Unless the court issues a temporary injunction, something the lawsuit included in its filing, a lawsuit of this nature could easily extend beyond the January 4, 2021 date at which the school closure expires. However, it is also possible that the Governor will extend the order if he believes that COVID-19 is still to rampant.

The sad thing is that Governor Beshear, who was just so eager to protect what he saw as Kentuckians’ rights when he was Attorney General has lost all sight of our rights with his COVID-19 orders. An even sadder thing is that people now have to go to court in the hope of protecting their rights, because our elected representatives sure won’t do it.

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Church leaders in Kentucky decline to agree with Governor Beshear’s request to close down But one idiotic pastor has practically dared the Governor to change his request to an order

We have previously noted Governor Andy Beshear’s (D-KY) request that churches in the Bluegrass State suspend in-person worship services through Sunday, December 13th. I pointed out that, as long as it was a request, rather than an order, the Governor was acting within his free speech rights. Churches, on the other hand, are acting in their First Amendment rights of Freedom of peaceable Assembly and Free Exercise of Religion regardless of which way they chose to go on Mr Beshear’s request.

Well, it seems as though many churches are honoring the Governor’s request by stating that they will continue to exercise great caution, but will remain open. From the Lexington Herald-Leader:

After Beshear’s request, some churches cancel services. Others ‘draw a line in the sand.’

By Karla Ward | November 21, 2020 | 08:42 PM EST | Updated 8:57 PM EST

While a number of congregations are complying with Gov. Andy Beshear’s request to halt in-person worship services through Dec. 13, others are reluctant to return to having only virtual services.

“I feel very strongly that churches have to draw a line in the sand,” Pastor Denny Whitworth, of the Bread of Life Assembly of God, wrote in a post on the church’s Facebook page. “I am concerned that this recommendation will possibly extend beyond the time frame laid out, this is always the trend. We are essential to our community and it is an opportunity to reach people for the kingdom of God, who may not be reached unless our doors are open.”

That’s an absolutely valid concern. The Governor’s initial church closure wasn’t a request, but an unconstitutional order, one he nevertheless got away with, and it lasted for nine weeks. On March 13th, he asked churches to cancel services, but many did not. So, on March 19th, he made it an order, with which almost all churches complied. In May, a federal judge granted a temporary restraining order allowing churches to reopen, and on May 24th, we were ever-so-graciously allowed to attend Mass again.

The Governor even sent the State Police to record license plate numbers on cars in church parking lots on Easter Sunday, Easter Sunday! to order the owners of the vehicles into quarantine.

Whitworth said the congregation will cancel fellowship meals until January, and he urged attendees at services to wear masks “coming in building and leaving” and to continue social distancing and other measures.

Several churches that said they plan to continue holding in-person services mentioned that they have taken careful steps to try to keep from spreading COVID-19.

This is what the Diocese of Lexington has done. My pastor holds Mass outside if the weather allows, though now that it’s the latter half of November, that’s a vanishing option. The Diocese insists on masks and social distancing, which has not been a problem even inside the church; my parish is a very small one.

Pastor Jeff Fugate, from his parish website.

Pastor Jeff Fugate of Clays Mill Baptist Church said many people, especially the elderly, may need to stay home, but the church does not plan to halt in-person services.

“There are many of us that are able and anxious to be in church for services,” Fugate wrote on his Facebook page. “I refuse to allow Governor Beshear who promotes the liquor business, abortion business and gambling . . . and keeps them open, to take away or threaten a Constitutional right of a church to assemble. If we as Patriotic Americans continue to sit back and allow this type of control to take place without resistance we are going to lose/give away our freedoms.”

Now that’s a man I can admire! But then he kept running his mouth:

Fugate said in an interview Saturday that the church had 500 to 600 people in attendance at its worship service Nov. 15. Most attendees, he said, do not wear masks. In addition, he said the church buses are running again, picking up a few hundred children for Bible classes each Sunday.

A church service at Clays Mill Baptist Church, picture from the parish website. The photo is not dated, so it could be from well before last March.

Way to go, Mr Fugate! Way to announce to the world, and Governor Beshear, and the Jessamine County Health Department, that what other congregations are doing to try to limit the spread of COVID-19 your church and you are not doing and, apparently, have no intention to do. Way to taunt the county and state into taking some sort of action.

If the Governor reads about this, and the Herald-Leader is delivered in Frankfort, the state capitol, Pastor Fugate has pretty much dared him to change his request to an executive order. Local people probably knew about how large the congregation is, and that masks weren’t being worn, and that occupancy restrictions weren’t being observed, but they could ignore it as long as nobody rocked the boat.

Pastor Fugate rocked the boat.

Was the Governor deterred from making his request an order by the federal judge’s ruling in May? I can’t read his mind, so I do not know, but Pastor Fugate, bless his heart, is trying to tempt the Governor into trying an order again. Yeah, he’d lose in court, again, but that would take several weeks and cost churches thousands of dollars. [1]Every Southerner knows just what “Bless your heart” means in a sentence like this

Governor Beshear hasn’t made it an order, at least not yet. In that, he has not violated Kentuckians’ freedom of religion or right to peaceable assembly, at least not in church. Though there are many, many things about which to criticize the Governor, this is not one of them. But now Pastor Fugate has virtually challenged the Governor to make it an order, and that’s just stupid.

The hornet’s nest on the corner of your porch really isn’t much of a problem . . . unless you poke it with a stick. Brother Fugate — I think that’s the appropriate form of address for a Baptist minister — has poked the hornet’s nest with a stick.

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↑1 Every Southerner knows just what “Bless your heart” means in a sentence like this
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The Catholic Diocese of Owensboro decides to remain open Governor Andy Beshear's request is denied!

As we previously noted, Governor Andy Beshear (D-KY) wants all churches to close:

Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear asked religious leaders across the state to immediately suspend all in-person gatherings at their houses of worship for the next three or four weeks, the president of the Kentucky Council of Churches said Thursday.

“This is a request from the governor, not a mandate, and it seems perfectly reasonable given the situation we are in with COVID-19,” said Kent Gilbert, who is also pastor of the historic Union Church in downtown Berea.

Gilbert was not certain if the request was until Sunday, Dec. 13 or through Dec. 13. The governor’s office did not immediately respond to questions about Gilbert’s comments.

If the Governor simply requested that churches ‘suspend’ services, then he was acting within his own First Amendment rights, his freedom of speech. If he attempts to order churches to close, then he is violating our free exercise of religion. His order restricting weddings and funerals to 25 or fewer guests, that we noted previously, is obviously unconstitutional, but the truth is that he got away with an order closing churches last March.

Well, at least some churches aren’t going to knuckle under:

Statement from Bishop William Medley, Diocese of Owensboro

November 19, 2020

“In consultation with the Archbishop of Louisville, the Bishops of Covington and Lexington, and the Catholic Conference of Kentucky, the Diocese of Owensboro wishes to announce that for the present the Catholic Churches of western Kentucky will continue our public worship as we have the last several months. Occupancy of churches will be limited to no more than 50%, facial coverings will be required, and physical distancing will be maintained.

This formula has proven successful and we cannot confirm even a single instance of transmission of the COVID-19 virus through our churches and our worship.

We acknowledge the difficult circumstances we face in the Commonwealth of Kentucky and appreciate Governor Andy Beshear’s efforts to promote the common good and the safety and well-being of our citizens.

We urge all citizens to heighten their observance of mandates. We pledge to continue our collaboration with healthcare officers throughout our region.

In regards to school closures, Governor Beshear yesterday (Wednesday, November 18, 2020) issued a mandate regarding the suspension of in-person classes for both public and private schools. In regards to our Catholic schools, this is disappointing as we believe that we have demonstrated that our schools can operate safely with the well-being of children uppermost in our actions.

In consultation with other Kentucky bishops, all Catholic schools in the state will comply with the governor’s directive.”

Regrettably, Bishop John Stowe, of the Diocese of Lexington, has not made any statement on the subject that I have been able to find, either in his Twitter feed or the Diocesan website. This is something that parishioners need to know. We normally get our parish bulletin via email on Saturday, so we should be notified in that if Mass is cancelled, but this is something the Bishop should have addressed and made public by today at the latest.

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Karens gotta Karen! Are we really living in a society in which snitching for violations of COVID-19 rules has become acceptable, become the norm?

If there’s such a thing as karma, this Karen ought to feel the wrath of it. If her neighbors know who she is, they should immediately ostracize her. From the Norfolk Virginian-Pilot:

Virginia Wesleyan women’s basketball player says she was dismissed from school over Thanksgiving gathering; others disciplined

By Ray Nimmo | November 19, 2020 | 8:31 PM EST

Multiple members of the Virginia Wesleyan University women’s basketball team have been suspended from on-campus housing and face additional sanctions from the athletic department, the college acknowledged Thursday.

Virginia Wesleyan did not say what those additional sanctions are, or how many players were disciplined. The school said an off-campus gathering led to the suspensions and said in a statement that “protocols have been repeatedly communicated throughout the campus community, athletic department, and all teams.”

Senior forward Makenna McSweeney, in graduate school for business administration, disputed that and said she has been dismissed from the school in the wake of hosting a Thanksgiving team-only gathering of 13 people.

The ‘gathering limit’ in Virginia is 25 people, not a lower number that people are used to reading about in other states. A gathering of 13 people did not constitute a violation.[1]I have presented this only for information purposes; this does not mean that I accept the idea that the government, at any level, can simply suspend our constitutional right to peaceably assemble. Thus, being punished for a gathering of fewer than 25 people must be a school rule, not the state’s.

An altercation between a neighbor and player occurred near the end of the two-hour event, and McSweeney said the neighbor’s subsequent call to the school led to the punishment.

So, what was the complaint? The article notes that “charges have been filed,” but does not give any details. What charges? Was the altercation physical or just verbal? And if the altercation involved only one player, that player not being Miss McSweeney, why is she the one being dismissed from VWU?

“We were called in (Wednesday), myself and the teammate that was in the altercation,” McSweeney said. “They said the neighbor had basically threatened to sue the school if we were not dealt with. The only claim they had is that we had a social gathering. The school can’t give us an explanation for (the punishment).”

OK, perhaps Miss McSweeney should have been dismissed from the college, for her atrocious grammar, but she is, apparently, being kicked out because she had her friends on the team over for a pre-Thanksgiving dinner. The officious little prick Karen got her way, getting the team members kicked out of their dorms, and Miss McSweeney expelled from school.

It should be noted that Virginia Wesleyan is the same college which fired forced professor Paul Ewell to resign after another officious little prick made public a private Facebook message in which he asked those who voted for Joe Biden to ‘unfriend’ him.

Is this really to where we’ve come? Are we really living in a society in which snitching for violations of COVID-19 rules has become acceptable, become the norm? The routine violations of our constitutional rights, the complacent acceptance of such by so many people, and the busybody nature of the “I’m going to tell on you!” over things which are not, and cannot be, crimes has led to far more damage to our society than the virus ever has.

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↑1 I have presented this only for information purposes; this does not mean that I accept the idea that the government, at any level, can simply suspend our constitutional right to peaceably assemble.
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It’s so easy for state Governors to order other people to lose their jobs The Democrats always claimed to be the party of working people, but they don't seem to understand that working people need to work!

COVID-19 is serious, and can be fatal. But there are other things which can be fatal as well, homelessness for one, especially if you have minor children. And eventually, the no evictions and no foreclosure orders will have to be ended.

From the Lexington Herald-Leader:

As Beshear closes dining in, restaurant owners say ‘This is the breaking point’

By Janet Patton | November 18, 2020 | 4:37 PM EST | Updated: 6:31 PM EST

Gov. Andy Beshear’s new capacity restrictions on Kentucky restaurants and bars could not have come at a worse time, Lexington restaurant owners said Wednesday.

Pushed to the brink by the coronavirus pandemic and the economic hardships it has brought, many were facing a tough holiday season already with just 50 percent capacity and waning outdoor seating.

Beginning Friday, they will be limited to takeout and outdoor seating until Dec. 13. Beshear announced Wednesday that all indoor restaurant seating will be closed.

“This is the breaking point,” said Heather Trump, co-owner of Shamrock Bar & Grille and the Cellar. Most were hoping to hang on to the beginning of college basketball season, when business was expected to pick up.

Limited just to carryout, she said, “you will see 30 percent of restaurants never come back.”

There’s more at the original.

So, what happens to all of the people employed at restaurants and bars, people once again being laid off, and with a large percentage of those businesses never to reopen? If the businesses fail, the workers can’t be called back to work. And while restaurants fail all the time, and are normally replaced by other restaurants — I remember one building in Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania, which had a new restaurant every year for four straight years — who’s going to decide to take the risk to open a new restaurant under these conditions?

Of course, the Governor has ordered the halt of all in person classes in the Commonwealth, both public and private, meaning layoffs for many education employees — teachers’ aides, school bus drivers, custodians, security guards, guidance counselors and the like — and will force many working parents, primarily women, to either miss work, because they have to stay at home to care for their children, or pay for all day day care, if they can find it, leaving them working for nothing.

When these people eventually wind up on the streets, some of them are going to be just as dead as if they had died from COVID-19.

And now His Excellency the Governor wants to close the churches as well:

Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear asked religious leaders across the state to immediately suspend all in-person gatherings at their houses of worship for the next three or four weeks, the president of the Kentucky Council of Churches said Thursday.

“This is a request from the governor, not a mandate, and it seems perfectly reasonable given the situation we are in with COVID-19,” said Kent Gilbert, who is also pastor of the historic Union Church in downtown Berea.

Gilbert was not certain if the request was until Sunday, Dec. 13 or through Dec. 13. The governor’s office did not immediately respond to questions about Gilbert’s comments.

If the Governor simply requested that churches ‘suspend’ services, then he was acting within his own First Amendment rights, his freedom of speech. If he attempts to order churches to close, then he is violating our free exercise of religion. His order restricting weddings and funerals to 25 or fewer guests, that we noted yesterday, is obviously unconstitutional, but the truth is that he got away with an order closing churches last March.

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Dictators gotta dictate! When state Governors get away with dictatorial actions once, they'll keep doing it until someone stops them

It is no surprise that those once drunk with power would again imbibe when there were no consequences for the previous drunken spells.

As we have previously noted, Governor Andy Beshear (D-KY) has gotten away with unconstitutional restrictions on people’s freedoms because the sheeple allowed him to do so. And now, proclaiming that COVID-19 is rising too fast, he is doing it again. From the Louisville Courier-Journal:

Gov. Andy Beshear unveils new coronavirus restrictions for Kentucky

By Grace Schneider and Emma Austin | November 18, 2020 | 4:19 PM EST | Updated: 4:42 PM EST

Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear announced multiple new restrictions Wednesday as the state continues to see a surge in coronavirus cases, including:

  • All public and private K-12 schools will close to in-person instruction starting Monday through the end of the semester. The only exception is for elementary schools in counties outside the red zone, which may reopen on Dec. 7 if the school follows all guidelines.

Uhhh, since when does the state have authority over private schools?

Beginning on Friday and lasting until Dec. 13:

  • All restaurants and bars will close to indoor dining services. Outdoor dining is still allowed, with some limitations.
  • Gyms are limited to 33% capacity, and no group classes or indoor games are allowed. Masks are required.
  • Indoor gatherings should be limited to two families, not exceeding a total of eight people.
  • Attendance at wedding and funerals is limited to 25 people.

If the situation is so dire, I have to ask, why are gyms being allowed to open at all? After all, if dining inside a restaurant is too hazardous to be allowed, why isn’t working out inside a gymnasium?

Outdoor dining is still allowed, albeit with restrictions? The low for tonight in Lexington is forecast to drop to 36º F. While Friday, Saturday and Sunday have forecast highs in the low sixties, starting Monday it gets colder again, with daytime highs in the low fifties, and nightly lows in the thirties and, beginning Saturday the 28th, dropping below freezing. Might as well just close ’em down for everything other than take-out.

“Indoor gatherings should be limited to two families, not exceeding a total of eight people.” If the Governor is stating that gatherings should be limited, then he is simply exercising his freedom of speech to ask Kentuckians to do this. If there are some sort of executive orders mandating this, then they are in violation of our First Amendment rights of peaceable assembly.

And sorry, but weddings and funerals are (normally) religious events, and no Governor, no state, no President and no government at any level have the power to prohibit the free exercise of religion.

The General Assembly must, in its next session, this January, pass strict limits on the Governor’s emergency powers under KRS 39A. The Governor must never be allowed to attempt to restrict our constitutional rights, and in other emergency decrees must have his authority limited to only fourteen days without calling a special session of the state legislature to either pass laws to extend them, or revoke the orders.

The Governor, intoxicated with power as he is, had no intention of meeting with the legislature over his decrees:

Beshear was asked at Friday’s (July 10, 2020 — Editor) news conference on COVID-19 why he has not included the legislature in coming up with his orders. He said many state lawmakers refuse to wear masks and noted that 26 legislators in Mississippi have tested positive for the virus.

Translation: he did not believe the General Assembly would give him his way, so he was not going to allow them any say in the matter at all.[1]The state Constitution calls the legislature into session once a year, in January, for a limited time. The Governor may call a special session of the legislature at any time, but the legislature does … Continue reading

Fortunately, the 2020 elections expanded the already strong Republican control in the legislature; the GOP will have veto-proof margins in both houses of the General Assembly. But we really cannot simply wait for the legislature to act; Kentuckians need to protest now, to show the legislators that we are opposed to the Governor’s actions.
__________________________________
Cross-posted on RedState.

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↑1 The state Constitution calls the legislature into session once a year, in January, for a limited time. The Governor may call a special session of the legislature at any time, but the legislature does not have the authority to call itself into session.
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The Supreme Court cared nothing about our First Amendment rights . . . while Ruth Bader Ginsburg was still alive With her replacement by Amy Coney Barrett, perhaps our rights will now be respected

Is the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States controversial? Apparently to some of our friends on the left, it is. During a virtual event with the Federalist Society’s National Lawyers Convention, Associate Justice Samuel Alito said:

For many today, religious liberty is not a cherished freedom. It’s often just an excuse for bigotry and can’t be tolerated, even when there is no evidence that anybody has been harmed. The question we face is whether our society will be inclusive enough to tolerate people with unpopular religious beliefs.

You can’t say that marriage is a union between one man and one woman. Until very recently, that’s what the vast majority of Americans thought. Now it’s considered bigotry.

Here’s the story from The New York Times:

In Unusually Political Speech, Alito Says Liberals Pose Threat to Liberties

The conservative justice’s pointed remarks, which he made in a speech to the Federalist Society, reflected thoughts he has expressed in his opinions.

By Adam Liptak | November 13, 2020

President Donald Trump, Justice Samuel Alito, and Senator Ted Cruz at te White House in 2019. Photo by Doug Mills/The New York Times

WASHINGTON — In an unusually caustic and politically tinged speech, Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. told a conservative legal group that liberals posed a growing threat to religious liberty and free speech.

The remarks, made at the Federalist Society’s annual convention Thursday night, mirrored statements Justice Alito has made in his judicial opinions, which have lately been marked by bitterness and grievance even as the court has been moving to the right. While Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. has tried to signal that the Supreme Court is apolitical, Justice Alito’s comments sent a different message

Coming as they did just weeks after Justice Amy Coney Barrett succeeded Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, giving conservatives a 6 to 3 majority, the remarks alarmed some on the left. But legal experts said there were few clear lines governing what justices may say off the bench.

The left were never alarmed, of course, when Associate Justice Ruth Ginsburg criticized then-candidate Donald Trump, but that’s different, don’t you know?

Naturally, the left waxed wroth over Justice Alito’s remarks:

Uhhh, just because you don’t like what someone says does not make it illegal. The First Amendment specifies:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Back to the Times/’ article:

On Thursday, Justice Alito focused on the effects of the coronavirus, which he said “has resulted in previously unimaginable restrictions on individual liberty.”

“I am not diminishing the severity of the virus’s threat to public health,” he said. “All that I’m saying is this, and I think that it is an indisputable statement of fact: We have never before seen restrictions as severe, extensive and prolonged as those experienced for most of 2020.”

Justice Alito was particularly critical of a ruling from the Supreme Court in July that rejected a Nevada church’s challenge to state restrictions on attendance at religious services.

The state treated houses of worship less favorably than it did casinos, he said. Casinos were limited to 50 percent of their fire-code capacities, while houses of worship were subject to a flat 50-person limit.

“Deciding whether to allow this disparate treatment should not have been a very tough call,” Justice Alito said. “Take a quick look at the Constitution. You will see the free-exercise clause of the First Amendment, which protects religious liberty. You will not find a craps clause, or a blackjack clause, or a slot machine clause.”

The ruling was decided by a 5-to-4 vote, with Justice Ginsburg in the majority. Her replacement by Justice Barrett may alter the balance on the court in similar cases, including a pending one from Brooklyn.

Associate Justice Amy Coney Barrett (Photo by Olivier Douliery / AFP) (Photo by OLIVIER DOULIERY/AFP via Getty Images)

In Calvary Chapel, Dayton Valley v Steve Sisolak, Governor of Nevada, the Court’s four liberal Justices, joined by Chief Justice John Roberts, denied injunctive relief, but did not issue an opinion. The four conservatives, Justices Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Alito, strongly dissented. What Justice Alito stated at the Federalist Society’s meeting was essentially what he wrote in his dissent. In the upcoming case, Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn v Andrew Cuomo, Justice Ginsburg has gone to her eternal reward, and Associate Justice Amy Coney Barrett, a devout Catholic, has replaced her. With the Brooklyn case, we can hope that the freedom of religion will once more be respected.

While no opinion was issued in Calvary Chapel v Sisolak, in a similar case, South Bay Pentecostal Church v Gavin Newsom, the Chief Justice wrote a concurring opinion, in which he simply deferred to the judgement of “local officials (who) are actively shaping their response to changing facts on the ground.” The fact that the free exercise of religion and the right of the people peaceably to assemble as they choose were of no moment to the Chief Justice.

I suspect that they will be of some moment to Justice Barrett.

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Karens gotta Karen!

As we have previously noted, Governor Andy Beshear (D-KY), the Lexington city government and the University of Kentucky have been very, very worried about people getting together and partying. On July 20, 2020, Governor Beshear had Eric Friedlander, Secretary for the Cabinet for Health and Family Services, and Steven J Stack, Commissioner of Public Health, issue an Order restricting gatherings of people, including on their private property, to ten or fewer persons. Unlike the Governor’s mandatory face mask order, which Mr beshear keeps reissuing every thirty days, the order linked above has no expiration date, and I have been unable to find any source which states that it has been lifted.

The past weekend in the Bluegrass State has been sunny and warm, in the upper seventies to low eighties, as we are enjoying a brief Indian Indigenous American summer. That, I suppose, explains a lot of weekend parties, despite the fact that the sadly-not-very-good UK football team had an open date last Saturday.

Well, whenever people are having fun, there will always be some Karens around to try to stop it. From the Lexington Herald-Leader:

Parties pushing the pandemic? Lexington police got 90 party complaints in 2 weekends

By Jeremy Chisenhall | November 9, 2020 | 2:27 PM EST | Updated: November 9, 2020 | 4:22 PM EST Parties in Lexington haven’t slowed down despite record-high COVID-19 case counts in the city the past two weeks. The Lexington Police Department said it received complaints about 60 large parties during Halloween weekend and another 30 over the just-completed weekend of the Breeders’ Cup. The parties were primarily in areas near the University of Kentucky campus, police spokeswoman Brenna Angel said. In comparison, there were 30 party complaints during the weekend of the Kentucky Derby, according to Lexington police. On average, there have been about 20 to 30 party complaints each weekend since classes resumed, Angel said. The city began a partnership in early October with UK police, and the deal was intended to increase patrols and tamp down on college game day parties. The partnership has continued as the university police department’s schedule has permitted, Angel said. The departments will partner to patrol the city for UK’s home football game against Vanderbilt University Saturday, Angel said.

Miss Angel had previously said that while an executive order signed by Governor Beshear on July 20 mandated that non-commercial gatherings must be limited to 10 people or fewer, police and local health department officials have said they can only do so much.

“There is nothing we can enforce regarding gatherings on private property,” Angel said.

The gatherings limit order delegated the enforcement authority not to the police but to the state and local health departments. The Lexington Police Department could try to break up or cite parties which were excessively loud or encroaching onto other people’s property, and the University Police, even though some of the officers have ridden along with the city police, have no authority off of campus property.

Daniel Cartier, a UK student, said he’d seen fellow students “party constantly and receive zero punishment.” “It just boggles my mind how UK (doesn’t) at the absolute minimum require bi-weekly testing and contact tracing for all their students,” he said.

Congratulations to Mr Cartier! Not many men males — and here I am assuming, from his first name, that he is male¹ — would publicly identify themselves as Karens.

A video shared to Reddit showed a large party in a Lexington backyard during the weekend. Commenters thought it was likely the partiers were students. “You really think college kids are gunna not party just because some old bureaucrats at the school say so? Maybe the administration at the school should have not allowed kids back to Lexington and just remove the possibility of kids in large gatherings with no masks or social distancing,” one commenter said.

The video, which appears to have been taken via cell phone, is only four seconds long and too distant to positively identify any of the participants.

This is what I have said all along: it’s amazing to think that college administrators would not have expected college students back on college campuses to have college parties. Perhaps some of our collegiate administrators and local officials are just not quite as smart as they would like people to believe.

State Treasurer Allison Ball (R-KY) noted that the Governor’s orders frequently violated our constitutional rights:

Ball said her report offered insight for lawmakers if they take up legislation to redefine the scope of the governor’s power to issue executive orders in times of crisis. She suggested that the law be amended to reinforce safeguards on religious, free speech and assembly rights protected by the U.S. Constitution. “It’s not fair to the people of Kentucky that they have to resort to federal courts to make sure that their constitutional rights are protected,” Ball said. “This could be dealt with pretty clearly if it’s included in legislation.” Senate President Robert Stivers later told reporters that lawmakers will review the subject of executive powers, saying: “I think we will clearly define what can be done.” “Are there needs for (executive) powers? Without a doubt,” he said. “But what type of limitations can you put on them so people have the ability to have … access to their church and access to the freedoms that are guaranteed by both the Kentucky and the United States constitution.” Republican lawmakers have complained for months that the Democratic governor, who was elected last year, hasn’t reached out to them to discuss his coronavirus-related actions. Republicans hold overwhelming majorities in the House and Senate.

That quote was from prior to the election; the 2020 elections have expanded the Republicans’ majorities further than even they had hoped.

Kentucky Republicans expanded their dominant 62-seat supermajority in the state House on Tuesday, flipping at least 10 seats occupied by Democrats and defending several targeted incumbents. By Wednesday morning, Republicans had picked up at least 10 of these seats from Democrats and led in three more races in Democratic-held districts where most of the votes were counted. This would give Republicans a 72 to 28 supermajority in the House chamber, with the possibility of expanding to 75 seats once the other races are called.

Translation: the GOP has a veto-proof majority in the state House of Representatives. In the state Senate, in which the GOP previously had a veto-proof majority of 28-10, Republicans picked up two more seats, for a 30-8 majority.

Governor Beshear would not consult with the General Assembly on his COVID executive orders, because he knew that the legislators would not give him carte blanche. As we have previously noted, the Governor had no intention of doing so:

Beshear was asked at Friday’s (July 10, 2020 — Editor) news conference on COVID-19 why he has not included the legislature in coming up with his orders. He said many state lawmakers refuse to wear masks and noted that 26 legislators in Mississippi have tested positive for the virus.

Now, if the General Assembly passes legislation to limit the Governor’s ’emergency powers’, and Mr Beshear vetoes it, as I would anticipate, Republicans have more than enough votes to override a veto.

But this still points out a problem: the Governor began issuing his executive orders to deal with COVID-19 last March. Various lawsuits resulted in injunctions against different parts of the orders, but, on July 17th, the state Supreme Court halted all state court efforts to block the orders. Then, three weeks later, the Court set September 17th to hear oral arguments on those cases, which meant that Mr Beshear’s executive orders would continue in force, without any recourse to the state courts to challenge them, for two more months before the state Supreme Court would even allow arguments against them.

As of this morning, two days shy of eight weeks after the oral arguments, the state Supreme Court has still not issued its ruling as to whether the Governor’s challenged orders are legal. 116 days have passed since the Kentucky Supreme Court halted all state court efforts by citizens to challenge the Governor’s orders, and we still have no ruling.

Rights delayed are rights denied. And with the news that a 90% effective COVID vaccine has been developed, it’s not difficult to see the state Supreme Court simply not ruling at all until next year, to see if the Governor suspends the challenged orders — the mandatory mask mandate is not part of the challenged orders — so the case can be dismissed as moot.

But even if the Court issues its ruling later today, and upholds the suspended injunctions against the Governor’s orders, Kentuckians’ rights will have been suspended for months. If we have to wait until the General Assembly takes action, we’re looking at almost a year in which our rights have been suspended and violated.

Cross-posted on RedState.

¹ – Perhaps an odd thing for a man named Dana to do, I suppose, but whatever!.

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What would the left see as going too far?

I often wonder: among those who support the various state governors’ and city mayors’ actions curtailing our constitutional rights to fight the spread of COVID-19, is there any step they could take that they would consider a step too far?

  • A Louisville judge has ordered a man who has been exposed to — the article did not specify ‘tested positive for — COVID-19 be fitted with ankle monitors, the type used to track some criminals and sex offenders on parole, but who has refused to self-quarantine. Two other Louisville residents who live in homes with someone who has tested positive are under similar ankle monitoring, including one who tested negative.
  • Governor Andy Beshear (D-KY) has had a hotline set up for informants neighbors to snitch on people non-compliant with his orders. Mr Beshear has also ordered that anyone entering the Commonwealth from neighboring states to self-quarantine for fourteen days, placed an armed deputy to enforce house arrest outside the home of a Nelson County man who tested positive but refused to self-quarantine, and ordered the state police to photograph license plates in church parking lots to see which parishioners are violating his orders suspending church services.
  • The state police in Pennsylvania are enforcing Governor Tom Wolf’s (D-PA) stay-at-home orders by citing a woman for ‘taking a drive’ for no ‘approved’ purpose.
  • The Philadelphia Police, whom the appropriately-named Commissioner Danielle Outlaw has ordered not to pursue petty crimes during the coronavirus emergency, pulled a man not wearing a mask off a SEPTA bus after he refused to debark.
  • Mayor Bill de Blasio (D-New York City) has stated that “the city could shut down certain places of worship if people continued to violate the state’s stay-at-home mandates and continue congregating for religious services there,” and that if religious leaders to not obey his orders, city officials “will take additional action up to the point of fines and potentially closing the building permanently.”
  • Governor Phil Murphy (D-NJ) stated that the police will break up any big parties and that the party-givers will be heavily fined.
  • Governor Gina Raimondo (D-RI) ordered the police to stop anyone with New York plates for questioning, and sent police and the National Guard “going door-to-door” in coastal communities, asking people if they’ve been to New York and requesting their contact information.
  • The sheriff of Wake County, North Carolina, ordered his department to stop processing background checks for new applications to purchase firearms.
  • Tarrant County, Texas, Commissioners, the majority of whom are Republicans, set fines and a jail term for up to 180 days for anyone who violates their emergency orders.
  • Mayor Jim Kenney (D-Philadelphia) issued ‘stay-at-home’ orders and banned “outdoor gatherings of any kind will be allowed unless they are related to essential businesses like food or medicine.”

These things are all violations of our First Amendment-guaranteed right of peaceable assembly and free exercise of religion, our Fourth Amendment-guaranteed right to be secure in body and property from government intrusion absent due process and a warrant, and our Fifth- and Fourteenth Amendment guarantees against deprivation of liberty and property absent due process of law.

Given that the majority seem to be cheering these authoritarian actions, these suspensions of our constitutional rights, because they are supposedly necessary, by elected state and municipal officials, I have to ask: just what would be a step too far even for the supporters of such actions?

  • An example: If someone said on social media, in response to Governor Beshear’s order that those entering the state must self-quarantine, “This is why we have the Second Amendment,” — note that I expressed that in terms which do not constitute a direct threat against anybody — would the left believe Mr Beshear went too far if he sent the state police to search the man’s house for weapons?
  • A nurse posted on Twitter that she quit her job because the hospital didn’t have enough Personal protective Equipment (PPE) and she was being exposed to COVID-19 patients, would the supporters say the governor of her state went too far if he said she could not resign and ordered her back to work?
  • If a state had too many people under self-quarantine orders to be able to enforce such against them, could the state then round up those people and place them in ‘camps’ where they could be monitored by guards?
  • If someone who had been exposed to the virus refused to be tested and refused to self-quarantine, could the state force him to be tested, and incarcerated until the test results came back, and keep him incarcerated or under house arrest for two weeks if the results came back positive?

Other scenarios could be constructed.

If we assume that those who support the actions of the various officials are intelligent people, concerned about our constitutional rights but believing that the protection of society somehow outweighs them, they must have some idea of what would be a step too far. I, for one, am interested in how such people think.