How much freedom are we willing to give up?

(David Kallman is a Lansing attorney.)

We all know the serious and deadly consequences from the virus that has swept the world in the past two years. We all experienced government actions attempting to address the problem.

The impact on families, individuals, businesses and places of worship was devastating. Government officials, often acting unilaterally outside the usual protections of our representative form of government, imposed many restrictions that the courts are now finding illegal and unconstitutional. I know this because I have represented many of these individuals in court.

Now that more information is exposing the ineffectiveness of many of the measures taken, it is important to consider how quickly we all gave up basic constitutional protections and inalienable rights. We must ask if we should do the same in the future if another pandemic arises.

Are we really prepared to go into lockdown mode again because of COVID-19 or other emergencies? Is the cure worse than the disease? Does everyone really understand the rights and liberties being eroded by unilateral actions of government officials, many of whom are unelected and unaccountable to the people, outside our constitutionally protected form of representative government? Why is there very little reporting on the large increases in mental health issues, deaths from suicide, cancer, the lack of needed medical care, and other harms caused by these mandates — especially in children?

Yet orders requiring the ubiquitous wearing of masks, social distancing, locking down nursing homes while requiring them to accept positive patients leading to the deaths of thousands, requiring businesses to record personal information of clients, curtailing the right of people to even meet in their homes, or at restaurants, gyms, and other businesses, were the norm.

Timothy Reichert told The Wall Street Journal: “The lockdowns mean that the right to earn a living is much more fragile and contingent than we thought. Consider that because of the lockdowns, my right, and yours, to earn a living depends on whether a governmental official allows it. … What is this other than a new and technocratic form of subservience? The surveillance state has a legitimacy that it did not have prior to COVID-19. It is now apparently legitimate for state and federal agencies to observe, as well as regulate, my daily social interactions.”

Former British Supreme Court Justice Jonathan Sumption told The Guardian: “The ease with which people could be terrorized into surrendering basic freedoms which are fundamental to our existence came as a shock to me.” How much freedom are we willing to give up in the name of safety? He said the emergency measures used were “the most significant interference with personal freedom in the history of our country.” He went on: “I do not doubt the seriousness of the epidemic, but I believe that history will look back on the measures taken to contain it as a monument of collective hysteria and governmental folly. Citizens should be treated as rational actors, capable of taking decisions for themselves and managing personal risk.” Sumption concluded that the government’s behavior was characterized by “a cavalier disregard for the limits of their legal powers.” He said the government discovered “the power of public fear.”

We face the same dangers in America. Will we also fail to care about the erosion of our constitutional rights until it is too late? We have a clear choice. Do we choose a country that shuts down its citizens, destroys businesses for the apparent good of the collective, and restricts liberty for the foreseeable future, all in the name of safety? In the alternative, do we choose a country that deals with the reality of the virus while encouraging personal responsibility and moving forward without throwing millions of Americans into poverty and dependency on the government? Do we choose a country that promotes an individual’s choice, in consultation with doctors, of what medicines they take for their own health needs?

We must choose wisely.