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Comment by dantheman | Hacker News Reader

Mandates like the one rolled out by Biden administration are definitely not legal, just like the eviction moratorium is not legal. The federal government does not have police powers and the agencies and regulators can't make rules outside their mandate.

The authority to mandate vaccines is at the state and local level.

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No police powers are being used, so I don't see how that is relivate. Also, the Agencies are not going out of their mandate. OSHA was created to make the workplace safer and by mandating vaccines, they are.

Police powers are obviously being used... how do you think laws and regulations are enforced?

If a business violates the OSHA rules and then doesn't pay the penalties, they are shut down and, if the business continues operating in violation of the regulators, arrested. That's the obvious and implicit statement. The police do that!

The police aren't out raiding houses but the police powers are obviously being used; it's the state's monopoly on violence! It's the government's biggest lever!

So all federal laws are invalid?

No? All federal laws rely on the police to enforce them. I'm a realist, not an anarchist.

Just don't pretend that there isn't a clear threat of violence, when you are making laws that tell people what to do or take their money.

ok so the point about federal laws being invalid because they are enforced by the police is invalid?

Are you intentionally misreading what I wrote?

I never said anything about federal laws being invalid. I said they are enforced by police action. Which is obviously true.

If you aren't vaccinated, you are fired because the government has mandated it. If you don't leave, you're trespassing and the police will most certainly going to be involved.

But in general, American oligarchs have figured out that private enterprise is a good way to circumvent constitutional and legal limits to their power.

This is also how the surveillance state came into existence. BigTech is a de facto arm of the government while maintaining legal separation. It does the dirty work because it doesn't have to play by the same rules government must. As naive libertarians like to say, it's private so it's all consensual so it's cool, man.

OSHA was not designed or ever granted power to mandate vaccines, just like the CDC was granted power to stop evictions.

Can OSHA mandate that employers create rules that employees must pass a physical fitness test? Must become vegetarian?

OSHA's charter is to reduce hazards in the workplace. Physical fitness tests have nothing to do with that. A deadly communicable disease that could be spread by co-workers falls squarely into the "workplace hazard" bucket.

> The federal government does not have police powers

Then what's the FBI?

An investigative agency.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Police_power_(United_States_co...

Unconstitutional. It is unconstitutional. And morally wrong, and very corrupt (look at literally anything Hoover have done, or recent scandal with spying, or Page and Strzok.)

What part of the constitution?

Constitution is whitelist not blacklist, what part give it permission?

Police power doesn't simply mean having a law enforcement agency. It means being able to do the daily policing work that the federal government is basically explicitly barred from doing except in particular circumstances.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Police_power_(United_States_co...

> Federal police power has been defined by Supreme Court rulings. In affirming that Congress has limited power to enact legislation, the court ruled in United States v. Lopez (1995) that "The Constitution...withhold[s] from Congress a plenary police power that would authorize enactment of every type of legislation."[6][7] In United States v. Morrison (2000), the court invalidated a provision of a federal law on violent crime. The court stated, "The regulation and punishment of intrastate violence that is not directed at the instrumentalities, channels, or goods involved in interstate commerce has always been the province of the States...[W]e can think of no better example of the police power, which the Founders denied the National Government and reposed in the States, than the suppression of violent crime..."[6][8]

Eh, you're technically right but the courts have interpreted interstate commerce extremely broadly. A pandemic is interstate in a similar sense as the wheat in Wickard v. Filburn.

Um okay... but he asked what the FBI was. Is the FBI enforcing covid vaccines? I don't think so

I used the FBI as an example of a federal agency that has broad enforcement powers and that most Americans don't consider unconstitutional.

A pandemic is much more legitimately interstate than anything in wickard v filburn

I agree that requiring large employers to require vaccines has a more significant effect on interstate commerce that a person growing wheat for their own use. I think it's a similar order of magnitude though.

How is mandating a remote employee, who's clearly not moving around a legitimate interstate interest. Pray do tell. In general, non-kangaroo courts require laws to be written to be suitably tailored and narrow in scope.

>How is mandating a remote employee, who's clearly not moving around a legitimate interstate interest

Do I get to use the same asinine reasoning they used in Wickard v. Filburn?

Because if not then your guess is as good as mine.

Didn't all public schools ask for student's vaccination card already? Legal and scientific

Public schools are locally controlled.

Fwiw; Biden has full authority to mandate federal employees are fully vaccinated.

Explain OSHA

Honestly... will someone please explain OSHA? It was held by many to be unconstitutional at the time of institution. It still is today. Just because the feds broke the law in the past doesn't mean we get to excuse it again in the future. The federal government is very good at breaking laws. At some point, they must be held to account.

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