Exploring the 10th Amendment, States' Rights,
and their importance during the COVID-19 pandemic
This week the question has been raised about how much power the states have to respond to public health crisis and whether the federal government can overrule them. A very important part of this discussion is the tenth amendment to the constitution which states, "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people."A really good article by David Schultz for how this relates to the current situation can be read at Bloomberg Law INSIGHT: State, Federal Police Quarantine Powers Raise Due Process Issues.
The "measures to combat a virus presents questions of federalism - do the states or the national government have authority to act, and if so, how? Protecting the public health is mostly up to the states although their power is not unlimited. States have police power, the authority to enact laws to protect its residents.
The "measures to combat a virus presents questions of federalism - do the states or the national government have authority to act, and if so, how? Protecting the public health is mostly up to the states although their power is not unlimited. States have police power, the authority to enact laws to protect its residents.
See the 10th Amendment, Reserved Powers
https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GPO-CONAN-1992/pdf/GPO-CONAN-1992-10-11.pdf
https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GPO-CONAN-1992/pdf/GPO-CONAN-1992-10-11.pdf
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