The Supreme Court rightly blocked President Joe Biden’s unconstitutional private sector vaccine mandate on Thursday, ruling that the Occupational Safety and Health Administration does not have the authority to issue such a sweeping rule without explicit permission from Congress.
“Administrative agencies are creatures of statute,” the court wrote in an unsigned opinion. “They accordingly possess only the authority that Congress has provided. The Secretary has ordered 84 million Americans to either obtain a COVID–19 vaccine or undergo weekly medical testing at their own expense. This is no ‘everyday exercise of federal power.’ It is instead a significant encroachment into the lives — and health — of a vast number of employees.”
The law OSHA relied upon to issue the vaccine mandate is broad and vague, which is in and of itself a problem, but it is not so broad as to allow the agency to make decisions about public health or a virus that is present both inside and outside the workplace.
The court writes: “The Act empowers the Secretary to set workplace safety standards, not broad public health measures. Confirming the point, the Act’s provisions typically speak to hazards that employees face at work. And no provision of the Act addresses public health more generally, which falls outside of OSHA’s sphere of expertise.
“Although COVID–19 is a risk that occurs in many workplaces, it is not an occupational hazard in most,” the justices continue. “COVID–19 can and does spread at home, in schools, during sporting events, and everywhere else that people gather. That kind of universal risk is no different from the day-to-day dangers that all face from crime, air pollution, or any number of communicable diseases. Permitting OSHA to regulate the hazards of daily life — simply because most Americans have jobs and face those same risks while on the clock — would significantly expand OSHA’s regulatory authority without clear congressional authorization.”
Exactly right. At the core of this debate is whether the federal government or individuals have the right to make their own risk assessments, which is what the majority opinion hinted at. Up until recently, we took for granted the right to weigh the risks for ourselves: We showed up to work knowing full well we could be exposed to the common cold or flu. We got behind the wheel of a car knowing we could end up in an accident during our commute. We consumed products, knowing what they might do to our health, without wondering what OSHA or the Biden administration might think of it.
The decision about how to approach a transmissible virus is no different, especially since recent data prove the virus will spread no matter what we do. Every single person will be infected with COVID-19 at some point — OSHA can’t stop that from happening, and it doesn’t get to determine how you respond to that threat. Fortunately, the Supreme Court agrees.
