A federal judge granted a preliminary injunction on Monday blocking the Defense Department from taking action against a group of 35 Navy sailors who had refused to get a coronavirus vaccine, raising questions on how it might shape the Pentagon’s requirement that all U.S. troops get vaccinated.
U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor found that . . .
Ah, I see: Reed O'Connor. You can always trust him to rule against anything associated with Democrats. But even for him, this is odd reasoning:
“This Court does not make light of COVID-19′s impact on the military. Collectively, our armed forces have lost over 80 lives to COVID-19 over the course of the pandemic,” O’Connor wrote Monday in a 26-page order.
But the judge added that the “loss of religious liberties outweighs any forthcoming harm to the Navy,” and that “even the direst circumstances cannot justify the loss of constitutional rights.”
....“The Navy has not granted a religious exemption to any vaccine in recent memory,” O’Connor wrote. “It merely rubber stamps each denial.”
Stop me if I'm wrong, but belonging to the military compromises all sorts of normal constitutional rights. The military services are actually pretty careful about religion, but free speech is certainly not encouraged. Peaceable assembly is more or less under their control. Freedom of the press doesn't exist. There are lots of guns around, but only under their direct supervision. A warrant to search your belongings? Not so much. (See Mayo v. Foley, "An Officer and a Gentleman," 1982.)
Am I misconstruing something? Restricting constitutional rights is surely something not to be done lightly, but "good order and discipline" is usually sufficient reason. That being the case, "preventing massive plagues on naval vessels" seems like it would easily qualify too.
Does this mean nuclear submarines might be manned by sailors sick with covid, assuming others covid free cannot be found?
I grew up as an Air Force brat. I remember my dad being commanded to receive immunization shots for several exotic diseases (exotic for Northern Europe where we were stationed) simply because the doses were about to expire and had to be used.
We changed the rules in the last couple decades limiting the number of vaccinations to only fully approved ones.
...but clearly this ruling is out of this world.
I believe there's precedent here, in Continental Army v. General George Washington.
The Federal Judiciary needs to have its wings clipped and the activist "conservative" judges in particular. It's hard, however, to craft a legal theory that can be applied to laws we want implemented as well as those we think are wrong. That said, I believe laws and regulations that are truly in the interest of public health, public safety, and national defense are core powers of government that should not be enjoined on the whim of a single appointed judge.
I use the word "truly" in the last sentence to address issues like abortion clinic regulations that are not really about public health, and are instead false issues being used to get around other laws.
Even is such a theory could be "crafted," right wing judicial legislators obviously would never agree to be bound by it. The only solution is for Democrats to win a higher percentage of elections.
I tend to be somewhat skeptical of claims about threats to "national security" and "operational readiness", because those concerns do get abused by the Pentagon and executive branch to get what they want or get out of what they don't want. But the risk of having segments of our military infected does seem like a pretty valid operational concern.
People who claim this exemption based on their religious opposition to the use of stem cells of an aborted fetus should be informed that they will be denied all other medications that also were so tested. They should be provided with a list of all medications they can no longer be given. They should swear under penalty of perjury that they do not use any of those medications currently and if they do it is because they were unaware those medications were involved in such research and will cease using them immediately. If found using them in the future they will be subject to dishonorable discharge.
One thing that has been exposed by COVID Vaccine resistance is the logical absurdity of religious exemptions, If a religious belief can mean whatever anyone says it means then the government can't mandate anything,
No major religion opposes vaccination. Most of the people now claiming to be religiously opposed to the COVID vaccine just discovered that they have this deeply held religious belief, they had no objection to every other vaccine mandate that they have been subjected to.
"No major religion opposes" is a big deal here-- none of these people claimed to be part of a religious group that objected, just that they individually had personal religious objections, as I understand it.
So this judge is willing to throw out the UCMJ because of ad hoc individual religious claims? Way cool! We can have the world's first antinomian military establishment.
I have a strong religious exemption to paying for the defense budget and I bet I could find a few major religions that might back up my claim. Pretty sure O'Connor wouldn't agree.
The military can send you to a foreign land to die, but they can’t order you to get vaxxed. That doesn’t even make sense.
This is in part the consequence of a "volunteer" military. Too may people have no first hand experience with how an army works. Including obviously this judge who is in the habit of not letting reality interfere with his ideology anyway.
I saw this headline yesterday and I was wondering why "religious freedom," however important, trumps the physical safety and health of others. Like, if I go out and say I have a deeply held religious belief that I need to thump billionaires on the head with a sledgehammer, do I win a constitutional argument?
Another warped wing nut judge taking the side of the warped wing nut military enlistees who lost their individual rights when they signed on.
I thought that as well, and wondered who the judge was since the article I read didn't say. But doesn't it mean that Chelsea Manning was imprisoned in violation of her free speech rights? Ditto Julian Assange, and pretty much every other spy.
Currently, the standing Supreme Court doctrine (for now) is the compelling interest standard. And it is hard to think of any government interest more compelling than national defense and the commander in chief's constitutional duty to carry it out.
This is nuts.
Two words: combat readiness