Triad Conservative

A Message to Police and County Sheriffs on COVID-19

Michael Peroutka, American View: 

(Almost all of us know someone who is in law enforcement -- whether it’s someone in our family, neighborhood, church, etc. The message below can used as written or be tailored and sent or given to law enforcement folks you know.  Feel free to remove the first two paragraphs and make it your own message.)

Hello, my name is Michael Anthony Peroutka.  I’m an attorney in the State of Maryland, a former Anne Arundel County Councilman, and a co-founder of the Institute on the Constitution. 

Today I have the privilege of addressing you on behalf of the Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association, the Institute on the Constitution, and RE-Open Maryland. 

This message is intended for SHERIFFS, POLICE OFFICERS AND OTHER LAW ENFORCEMENT OFFICIALS.

The Constitution of Maryland, Article 44 states, “That the provisions of the Constitution of the United States, and of this State, apply, as well in time of war, as in time of peace; and any departure therefrom, under the plea of necessity, or any other plea, is subversive of good government, and tends to anarchy and despotism.”

Now, there are many who are saying that this current Covid-19 crisis makes it necessary to suspend the exercise of God-given, constitutionally protected rights; including the freedom to practice religion, freedom of assembly and association as well as the freedom to move about without molestation. But this is precisely what Article 44 addresses and forbids. 

In point of fact, no governor, in any state, has the authority to suspend the Constitution.  And no pretended “Emergency Powers” legislation can give it to him because the legislature cannot give the Governor an authority that they, themselves, do not have.

And any attempt for a Governor to suspend Constitutional rights is an act of lawlessness and a violation of his/her oath of office.

When you took your oath of office, as a Sheriff, police, or other law enforcement official, you swore obedience and fidelity to the United States Constitution and the Constitution of your state.  You solemnly declared THAT YOU WOULD ALWAYS FOLLOW THE CONSTITUTION.  You did not swear allegiance to a mayor or a governor or a judge or a president.

Right now, I’m encouraging you to remember that solemn promise and to live up to its terms.

Because right now, as your country and your state are in peril, it is especially crucial that you rededicate yourself to this noble calling and duty.

Your fidelity to your oath and to the rule of law requires you to abstain from enforcing any edict or order from a Governor, or any executive, which lacks constitutional authority.

Moreover, your duty requires that you resist such edicts and orders and that you act in such a manner as to shelter and protect the citizenry from all acts of lawlessness, even and especially when they originate from civil authorities.

Roy Cooper, Trust Carolinians

Abuses and Usurpations...

Serious Questions About Governor Cooper's Chief Health Advisor

The state of North Carolina has a new media darling. It is Dr. Mandy Cohen, the state Health and Human Services Secretary. Dr. Cohen is a physician who initially trained in internal medicine but later went into the field of public health.

The Raleigh News and Observer had a shameless puff piece about Dr. Cohen last week. In fact, they named her Tarheel of the Month. According to the corrupt media's values, she is pushing all the right buttons. And she possesses at least four or five attributes that make her an instant candidate for media hagiography.

But there are some serious questions about Dr. Cohen's handling of this entire situation. 

It turns out that the medical residency I completed had trained a number of physicians to go into the field of public health. Accordingly, I had considerable exposure to the field, including rotations at the state health department and a couple of county health departments; and also a number of other types of educational experiences and exposures in the field. I did not go into the field of public health, however.

The major text that my residency required in the field of public health still sits on my bookshelf. I pulled it out a couple of days ago to review it. It is the Maxcy-Rosenau text edited by John Last (12th edition, copyright 1986). It was represented to us that this was the "bible" in the field; and we used to refer to it as "the Last text". It is fairly hefty, at nearly 2000 pages.

In any case, I will list here the concerns I have based on my review of the relevant portions of the Last text and other considerations.

1. Cooper's health advisor recommended measures that go far beyond the recommended measures for communicable disease control. An entire chapter of the Last text (chapter 4) discusses measures to control the spread of infectious diseases. It discusses isolation of cases and quarantining contacts. It discusses various hygienic measures. Contact tracing is certainly advocated. But there is no discussion of the widespread shutting down of businesses and churches as we have seen in North Carolina. The text also does not recommend placing the entire population under house arrest for a prolonged period of time as we have seen with Cooper's statewide "stay-at-home" order. 

Given the fact that the mortality of COVID-19 has been demonstrated to be similar to some of the more severe flu epidemics, it might  be interesting to see the discussion regarding flu in Chapter 5 of the text: "There may be many reasons to avoid large crowds or known sources of infection when influenza is epidemic, but regulating travel and personal behavior would be impractical, temporizing, and is generally unwarranted." It should be noted that the Last text described and acknowledged previous epidemics, including flu and smallpox, that killed millions of people.

2. Cooper's health advisor violated some of the basic ethics of public health practice. Chapter 65 in the Last text discusses the ethics of public health. It describes, correctly, that public health authorities possess under state law certain police powers-- for instance, the prerogative to require that people with certain infectious diseases be quarantined, and that they reveal their contacts. But the text cautions that public health authorities must be cognizant of the rights of the public; and specifically must respect constitutional rights. It was considered mandatory that public health authorities find the proper balance. Nowhere does the text recommend or advocate suspending the constitutional rights of the general public. Of course, that is not the approach we have seen in North Carolina with COVID-19.

3. A couple of the early representations supporting the necessity of the lockdown turned out not to be true. We were told initially that we would just need a lockdown of a few weeks to "flatten the curve". We were further told that flattening the curve was necessary because hospitals would be over-run and would not have enough ventilators. Neither of these premises turned out to be true. The lockdown was extended for a much lengthier period of time. And the hospitals came nowhere close to reaching their capacity, or running out of ventilators. Inasmuch as these were public health judgments the Governor used to justify his actions, it is reasonable to question whether these represented faulty judgments, or whether the public was not being told the truth.

4. The handling of the COVID-19 epidemic was arguably negligent. Let's accept the premise that the COVID-19 epidemic is so catastrophic and cataclysmic that it justifies suspending the constitutional rights of citizens. That, of course, was Dr. Cohen's recommendation to the Governor. But if it was so bad, then she should have previously recommended a suspension of air travel into the state, and shut down our airports, because that was probably the key means by which the epidemic was seeded in our state. Moreover, given the fact that mass transit spreads the infection like wildfire, she should have recommended shutting  down mass transit. But she did neither of these things.

If we accept the premise that an insufficient supply of ventilators justified the shutdown, then we must reasonably ask whether, during her previous years as health secretary, she assured that we had enough ventilators in the state.  Did she  maintain an adequate stockpile or require that hospitals maintain significant reserves? Apparently not. Moreover, it is quite evident that, because of the massive slowdown among the state's large hospital systems and the overall atmosphere of fear created, many people are not receiving the medical care they need for other conditions. To the extent that the state's response triggered this slowdown, it hurt people medically. Finally, the state's response has triggered massive economic losses. The above factors suggest that the state's public health response, as recommended to the governor, was negligent. This resulted in many innocent people getting hurt unnecessarily, in myriad ways.

5. Cooper's health advisor is a physician who does not appear to be listed on the North Carolina Medical Board website as being licensed in the state of North Carolina. State law requires that physicians practicing here must be licensed in the state of North Carolina. If Dr. Cohen is a physician who is providing medical or public health advice to the governor, then she must be licensed in the state. Public Health physicians must be licensed. The North Carolina Medical Board maintains a database online of physicians licensed in the state that can be searched by the public. She is not found on this database. That raises the question as to whether she is licensed in the state, because if she is not, then she is breaking state law. It is possible, of course, that she might be licensed under her maiden name, but she publicly uses her married name.

6. The law has been broken. I have previously argued here that Governor Cooper has broken the law. I believe that to be true based on his suspension of constitutional rights and his negligence that resulted in harm to many North Carolina citizens. But if that is true of Governor Cooper, then it is also true of his chief public health adviser.

We must keep in mind that the media and their allies on the left insist that public policy regarding COVID-19 is being guided by medical and scientific facts and input. But there is considerable disagreement within the medical and public health communities that the right course is being taken.

In the state of North Carolina, Dr. Mandy Cohen is the personification of the medical input that is guiding public policy. That warrants much scrutiny given the considerations described above.

Small Businesses: Now is the Time to Act

The above clip is from the old TV series, The Twilight Zone. It struck me how uncannily it illustrates our current situation in North Carolina. The man at the elevated podium at the end of the table, who directs that the Obsolete Man is to be liquidated, represents Governor Roy Cooper and all of his allies and supporters.

They don't hesitate to hurl the small businessman and his employees into the metaphoric ovens. They don't give it a second thought when they force churches to close. These simply don't matter because there are Higher Purposes.

Governor Cooper's most recent announcement assures that many businesses will not be able to open until May 23 at the earliest.  Cooper and his chief health officer artfully devised their preconditions for reopening to assure they would be very difficult to meet. This means we could potentially be seeing a date much later than May 23.

Unfortunately, the people of North Carolina have behaved like sheep thus far. The churches and the denominational bodies representing them have not even begun to mount an opposition. Businesses across the state have dutifully complied, with little fight, even as the life is sucked out of them.

These businesses and churches have no political allies. The Republicans in Raleigh have done nothing so far; and have given little indication that their approach will change.

Various organizations are supposed to represent small businesses. For instance, most of these businesses will have regional and national trade associations of which they are part. Of course, there are Chambers of Commerce at the local level and at the state level. There is the National Federation of Independent Business, which has a state affiliate office in Raleigh, and other similar organizations. Many of these organizations have the wherewithal to initiate litigation against Cooper; and they really need to act. Individual businesses with resources also should do so. It is good that the new group, Reopen NC, seems to be exploring this possibility.

The churches and denominational bodies ought to be fighting for their religious liberty, just as Roger Williams and John Witherspoon and the early Baptists did. They ought to be engaging with local law enforcement with an eye toward reopening, and otherwise planning litigation. Perhaps they also ought to be engaging in some peaceful, civil disobedience, in a manner not unlike Martin Luther King, Jr., and begin holding services. It is not the state's prerogative to tell us that we cannot exercise our religious freedom.

Indeed, Cooper needs to be the object of an outright stampede of litigation.

The socialists don't hesitate to drive people to bread lines and poverty and dependency. They don't hesitate to take away our liberties. Gaining more power and control over people, and enacting revolution, are their objectives.

But there is a flip side of this coin. Those who refuse to fight for their liberty deserve to lose it.

Constitution Course, Lecture 12

This is the final lecture in the constitution course: 

Cooper's Requirement to Postpone Church Until Beyond May 23: What Christians' Response Must Be

The news yesterday was just as expected. Governor Roy Cooper laid out an approach toward reopening that drags things out much longer.

What is the effect on churches? You cannot reopen until some time after May 23, unless you limit your services to 10 persons or less. But there are no guarantees as to when the reopen date will be. It could be much later. Of course, for many churches, limiting services to ten participants is completely unworkable.

Churches throughout the state were blindsided by Cooper's edict 6 weeks ago to shut down. Most of us never imagined this would happen in the United States, and particularly in North Carolina. But here we are.

The reaction among churches of various denominations thus far has been muted and patient. Some cite biblical verses suggesting that we are subject to civil authorities, all of whom are presumed to be ordained by God. Some have justifiable humanistic concerns for their members and even their clergy.  There has been a longstanding feeling among significant elements of the evangelical community that our role is not to be political actors; and that it certainly is not the role of the church to be a political actor.

But some might argue that the non-response of the churches and denominations warrants major concern.

Some churches and clergy likely fear ostracism and even arrest in the current environment. We have seen how the media have portrayed the church and Christians over many years. And we have seen over the last six weeks how the media, government and the progressive/secular communities have been eager to target churches that attempt to reopen.

But I have several additional concerns.

First, it is clear that the response to COVID-19 has been a massive political over-reaction. The virus and its effects are real, but the response is a scam and a fraud. I have written about this here previously.

Second, the response of the various churches and denominations seems to place little emphasis on the importance of believers physically coming together for corporate worship. It seems to place little emphasis on our obligations to God Himself. 

Worshiping online or by watching a televised service is not an adequate substitute for corporate worship. After all, if they were, why even bother going back to church? These are simply not comparable, and we would not ordinarily recommend these as adequate substitutions except for those who have no other choice.

Third, my concern is that Governor Cooper and his chief health officer are part of a broader progressive/socialist community that would be more than happy for the authentic Christian church to never meet. And my intuition, which I cannot prove, is that their actions are part of a broader political effort to achieve a certain agenda. Cooper is a liberal mainline Presbyterian-- a branch of the Protestant church that is no longer truly Christian. And his health secretary, a former Obama Administration official, has a Jewish surname.

Let's think about the reaction to the church shutdowns among some of the state's orthodox Christian communities. The Catholic church, when I was growing up, used to consider weekly attendance at Mass and partaking of the Eucharist to be an absolute requirement. It was considered to be a sin to "play hooky". But the Catholic church in North Carolina has been fairly silent. The influence of Pope Francis is beyond the scope of this discussion.

I think about my own group, the Baptists. There are different types of Baptists, but none thus far have made a fuss, as far as I know. Nor have the Eastern Orthodox, or the other various conservative/evangelical/orthodox Protestant denominations.

Apparently, we are to believe that religious liberty no longer matters. But let's think about our history.

John Witherspoon was the great Founding Father who was extremely influential-- a huge figure. He was a Presbyterian minister and an original signer of the Declaration of Independence. Witherspoon was among a group who put everything on the line, and assumed enormous risks, for liberty. He had been particularly concerned about the possibility of the British government, or the new American union, imposing an established church.

Here is a great quote from Witherspoon: 

There is not a single instance in history, in which civil liberty was lost, and religious liberty preserved entire. If therefore we yield up our temporal property, we at the same time deliver the conscience into bondage.

Roger Williams preceded Witherspoon. He was a Puritan minister who helped establish the first Baptist Church in America. That church still sits in Providence, Rhode Island-- just a  stone's throw from Brown University. He was also an ardent advocate for religious liberty, and extremely influential in his time.

The Baptists-- again, my own group-- have an enormous legacy with regard to religious liberty. It dates back to Thomas Helwys nearly 500 years ago in England. But many fought for religious freedom during the earliest days on this side of the Atlantic also.

It was the struggle of Baptists in Virginia that led James Madison and Thomas Jefferson to advocate for religious liberty; and ultimately write and get passed the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom in 1786. This statute is considered to be a forerunner for the religious liberty clause in the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. Prior to the passage of religious liberty laws in Virginia, Episcopalians were persecuting Baptists there mercilessly.

But let's be clear. All Christians in America benefit from this legacy left by Witherspoon and Williams and the work of the early Baptists.

What do we do with that legacy now that civil government prohibits our activities with little justification in the wake of COVID-19?

I recommend a few things.

Local churches ought to begin having discussions with law enforcement authorities-- county sheriffs and police chiefs-- as soon as possible. They need to seek their agreement not to interfere with their constitutional rights. And after having these discussions, they should meet for worship services every week (or Mass), taking all necessary precautions and with warnings delivered to the elderly and vulnerable individuals.

And if they elect to re-open, as they should, they need to steel themselves and be fully prepared for the reaction from the corrupt media and various other elements of the community.

Denominational bodies ought to pursue litigation against the state on constitutional grounds. Those suits ought to be filed as soon as possible to seek an injunction against Cooper and Cohen. In the case of my group, the southern Baptists, that would be the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina that ought to be acting. Perhaps these denominational bodies could seek help from the various legal groups that work heavily on religious liberty issues. But if necessary, local counsel could be retained.

One of the effects of Governor Cooper's prohibition on church services is that some churches are now in major financial difficulties. Fixed costs do not magically go away. He has dealt a major hit to churches.

But it is clear that now is the time to act.

Addendum 4/25: Our Place Cleveland County points out that The Black Regiment is Missing.

Are the Bolsheviks on the Greensboro City Council Going to Require Masks?

The Rhino Times is reporting that eight out of nine city council members are poised to require that local residents wear a mask whenever they leave their homes. Mayor Nancy Vaughan is talking up compulsion.

One particular dingbat on the council, Sharon Hightower, stated the following:

“I support her in making these masks mandatory. Since the county did not extend that order. People are not social distancing at all. People are even out walking in the park.”

The horrors! People are walking in the park!

Another ninny on the council, Yvonne Johnson, openly boasted that she had assaulted someone, which is a crime in most places:

Johnson also offered this piece of advice to those that have problems with others keeping their social distance. She said, “I keep a can of Lysol in my car and, if somebody gets to close, I spray them with Lysol. I did it. I actually did it.”

This is the cost of having nearly nine ninnies and dingbats on the council.

But in reality, what they have been proposing is much more reminiscent of Stalin's Soviet Union, or Mao's China, than a republic founded and based on liberty.

Twelve years ago, another city council in Greensboro severely overstepped its bounds which resulted in a changing of the guard. I do not know whether that might be possible again. But this council risks a realignment of some type if it continues to act in a dictatorial, authoritarian fashion. It risks a backlash if it continues to implement tyranny.

Constitution Course, Lecture 11

Why Governor Cooper is Horribly Wrong