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Governor Ducey, Stop the Petty Tyrants
Republican governors have been successfully panicked into letting the same local thugs, who reveled in the powers granted to them during the Great Lockdown, now order American citizens to cover their faces, some with as much legal force as the Saudi religious police. Governor Abbott of Texas at least had the wisdom to forbid any criminal penalties under this exercise in bodily control over every free person. Governor Doug Ducey has not been so bright, and so will rightly accrue state-wide blame against the Republican Party. He must immediately amend his latest executive order, number 2020-40, to prohibit anything more than a parking ticket sort of civil penalty for mask non-compliance.
Mesa, Arizona, is muddling through a middle route, requiring masks in most public indoor settings but not while eating or drinking. They will levy civil fines for persistent non-compliance, limited to $50, following Maricopa County.
Mesa issued its mask order Monday, June 22. It was published as a non-text enabled PDF image file. The city council notably exempted schools, a sane decision. Their order really amounts to requiring mask use in interacting with people indoors. Exceptions include working out in a gym or swimming, as well as sitting at a bar or a restaurant table when served food or drink. There are medical and religious exemptions that may be invoked without challenge.
Maricopa County, which contains the largest Arizona cities, has set a maximum fine of $50 for the second and subsequent violations. Queen Creek had intended to treat its citizens as its masters and as fully enfranchised adults but noted Maricopa County’s order. And then there is Scottsdale.
Scottsdale’s government let their fascist flag fly free, including patronizing language about this all being what is best for you subjects:
Continued failure to comply with an emergency proclamation is a misdemeanor.
Think about that. They had a choice of civil penalties, but they want to put their shiny leather boot firmly on your neck. In the intervening days, they have dug in on their un-Arizona tyranny, reflecting California Democrat ideological contamination.
Governor Ducey has had days to survey local government responses. He should now modify his order, limiting from local government and setting the statewide maximum penalty to mirror the Maricopa County order.
Ducey could use verbiage about the uncertainty of the science, changing official opinions, and the enormous burden placed on Arizona families by government responses to the pandemic. He should rehearse the public policy movement against criminalizing behavior, noting this falls unevenly on those with fewer resources to contest police and prosecutors’ actions.
Each local order cites to and relies upon the governor’s executive order to get at emergency powers. It appears that state law likely limits local orders to the bounds of the governor’s order. Indeed, Governor Ducey gave local governments the green light expressly in his order, while covering with weak verbiage about the focus on educating people into compliance. The relevant statutory language is:
26-307. Power of counties, cities, towns and state agencies designated by the governor to make orders, rules and regulations; procedure
A. State agencies when designated by the governor, and counties, cities and towns may make, amend and rescind orders, rules and regulations necessary for emergency functions but such shall not be inconsistent with orders, rules and regulations promulgated by the governor.
It is an outrage that any government would dare to impose criminal penalties for such an invasive imposition on individual bodily liberty. I had thought we were in a moment of criminal law reform. Since when should any local government be allowed to threaten criminal records for dissent from edicts so poorly supported by “science” or “public health,” with flip-flops at every level of supposed expertise and medical authority?
Ducey, do right! The eyes of Arizona are upon you.
Published in Domestic Policy
Starting tomorrow, all Arizonans are now exempt, due to “mental health condition”. Extreme Individual Liberty Syndrome.
That’s easy, all you need is a Doctor’s note.
Actually, they are prohibited from asking for any proof. That avoids the whole federal law problem of collecting and protecting patients’ medical information.
I find it interesting that the “masters” are calling the edict a proclamation, something that I have always heard as coming from ruling royalty. Maybe that is what they have in mind.
Governor Abbott has said that while he won’t allow individuals to be charged or fined for not wearing masks in public, it’s ok for local governments to fine businesses the don’t make their customers wear masks. Guess what? Many local governments, my county’s included, have told businesses that they must make their customers wear masks or be fined. A note of interest – out of 30 million people, in the last 5 months or so, Texas has only had 101,772 confirmed cases of COVID and 2,128 deaths from it.
What limit is there on the fines, if any? Sounds like Abbott needs to look at local behavior and then undercut Democrats by imposing a state-wide limit on mask fines. In any case, he seems to be preventing any criminal penalties or attacks on business licenses.
Fines are collected at the point of a gun.
I have suddenly developed a medical condition that makes it difficult to breathe with a mask on. If I suddenly just really, really feel that I should wear a mask in an establishment I wish to patronize I just pull out the dingy paper one I’ve been carrying around in my purse for two months (it’s not too, too dirty).
I see a new medical bracelet in a lot of people’s future. Just emboss the outside with BLM and LBGT symbology along with “Mask Allergy” and you’re golden.
As a Scottsdale resident I agree the city has gone overboard. I support the Maricopa County ordinance.
I haven’t seen any mention of a limit on the fines, so I don’t think there is one. The number I’ve seen mentioned is $1000. Now whether that’s per day, per customer found inside without a mask, or something else, I have no idea.
I think it’s per citation.
So some official walks into a grocery store and notices 10 people without masks. Would he write up one 1 citation or 10? I’m not sure which would apply.
I wouldn’t know. Maybe 11: one for each transgressor and one for the store that allowed it. I would guess that it would have to do with the locality and the edicts of the local executive.
I don’t see why the Governor should save the people of Scottsdale from the city council that they elected.
I love how all of these things start with: “medical research has shown.” That is an outright lie.
I hate to say it- but I think there should be mass protests and rioting.
It’s about revenue generation, not unlike traffic cameras . . .
Pretty sure that if everyone got a mask like mine, mask mania would die down pretty darn quick.
I told my wife that I plan to get the flimsiest silk bandana I can find and wear it only over my chin. I refuse to comply with these tyrannical edicts.
Hey Boss, if everyone kept the Chinese virus away just by wearing a mask like yours, then you have proven the lie that masks can protect. I can’t see the virus, but I sure can see all the gaps in your mask.
@cdor, this whole mask thing is rooty-poot. Just like taking off your shoes for airport security. It’s all theater.
Some call it Virtue Signalling, but for an old SF dude, rooty-poot works real well.
Because the city council is using a tool given them by the governor. He owns the abuse if he fails to fix his own executive order.
Are they? Aren’t city councils authorized to enact public health and safety ordinances, including misdemeanor criminal charges?
The relevant statute appears to be ARS 9-240, “General powers of common council.” Subsection 20(a) grants authority: “To provide regulations to prevent the introduction or spread of contagious, loathsome or infectious diseases within the town.” Subsection 28(b) grants authority: “To enforce the observance of such ordinances, and to punish violations thereof by fine or imprisonment, or both, and by confinement at hard labor, in the discretion of the magistrate or court before whom a conviction may be had, but no fine shall be imposed exceeding two thousand five hundred dollars, nor imprisonment or confinement at hard labor exceeding six months.”
Technically, this statute applies to towns, not cities. ARS 9-499.01 grants cities the same powers as incorporated towns.
I’m not sure that the Governor has authority to override an ordinance that has been duly enacted by a city council. It is possible that I am incorrect about this, so if you have contrary information, please let me know. ARS 26-307(A) provides: “State agencies when designated by the governor, and counties, cities and towns may make, amend and rescind orders, rules and regulations necessary for emergency functions but such shall not be inconsistent with orders, rules and regulations promulgated by the governor.”
I’m not sure about the limits of this authority, or any prior case law. If presented to me as a question of first impression, I would be inclined to interpret this clause to allow a city council to make an order, rule, or regulation relating to an emergency, even if the city council did not otherwise have such power, if specifically authorized by the governor in connection with an emergency. I would not be inclined to interpret this provision to divest a city council of a pre-existing statutory power.
So I don’t think that Gov. Ducey “owns the abuse.”
Clifford, I find your hostility to Gov. Ducey difficult to understand. I agree with you that the decision of the Scottsdale city council was unnecessary and excessive. It’s not clear to me why you are blaming the Governor, whose approach seems to be reasonable, rather than the Scottsdale government.
It is not about “hostility.” It is about accountability and not losing in November. Look again at ARS 26-307(A), highlighted in my partial quote of your comment. Whatever the locals do must not be inconsistent with the governor’s order. So, if he prohibits criminal penalties for violations of directives under the executive order, it is likely that criminal penalties are off the table in local government deliberations. The Scottsdale emergency proclamation, linked in the OP, leans heavily on Governor Ducey’s executive orders as a basis for their proclamation. See, especially, this paragraph:
The point is that Governor Ducey, like Governor Abbott, has had a chance to take the measure of local governments. He can easily take action to modify his latest executive order. He should do so, and would be quite popular for so doing. Set the upper limit at the Maricopa County mark: $50-. Let a local government go to court for harsher penalties against their residents.
Surprise. Power to impose almost anything for any purpose, or do to do for anyone or to anyone, grows and tends to remain. It’s the first concession that matters.
Speaking of Governor Abbott: Gov. Greg Abbott halts elective surgeries in big metros, pauses further reopenings as Texas’ coronavirus cases spike
According the the update I receive from The Dallas Morning News, over the last 3 months, Texas (a state of about 30 million people) has experienced 128,252 confirmed cases of COVID and 2,269 deaths.
It is amazing how governors respond when they allow themselves to be frightened. This is why we have historically placed so much emphasis on separation of powers. An invasion maybe rises to the level… This epidemic does not.