Window of opportunity 稍纵即逝的好机会_其他

Window of opportunity 稍纵即逝的好机会

Our legal history is filled with cases where government has had insufficiently important reasons to justify restrictive measures, or where the measures themselves are overly broad. Or even cases where government restrictions turn out to have been implemented for impermissibly discriminatory reasons, such as when the city of San Francisco targeted only its Chinese residents in a bubonic plague outbreak in 1900. Not all exercises of the police power will withstand constitutional scrutiny.

But the very existence of this framework—the balance between the need to protect the public and individual rights—assumes that there will be times when there are truly compelling emergencies justifying severe measures. A global pandemic that spreads even among those who are asymptomatic and could exceed the capacity of the American health care system would appear to be just such a compelling situation.

When prominent voices tell the public that these drastic measures are somehow inherently unlawful or obviously unconstitutional, they detract from the social solidarity we need right now. People who are misled about what the government may do, and confused about its established powers, might not take heed of the necessary measures to protect their own health and that of their communities.

At some point in the future, we could see a coronavirus response that has gone on too long or is too broad to justify its burdens. Or we might see instances of people who were denied civil liberties without real justification. Even now, you might feel that these measures are too little, too late, or that they are drastic, and burdensome. But if we are facing a window of opportunity that is rapidly closing, to say that the states cannot try to use their most basic authority to save lives is not only wrong—it might be deadly.