The law is clear: the government has broad power in a public health emergency to take the steps needed to stop the spread of a communicable disease. In 1905, the Supreme Court declared: “Upon the principle of self-defense, of paramount necessity, a community has the right to protect itself against an epidemic of disease which threatens the safety of its members.”
This is not a new principle. A few years after the end of the Revolutionary War, Philadelphia was isolated to control the spread of
yellow fever. By the time the Constitution was drafted and approved, quarantine was already a well-established form of public health regulation. States, as part of their police power, were deemed to have the authority to order quarantines to prevent the spread of communicable diseases. In 1926, the
Supreme Court wrote: “it is well settled that a state, in the exercise of its police power, may establish quarantines against human beings, or animals, or plants.”
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