By David Cole and Daniel Mach
Do vaccine mandates violate civil liberties? Some who have refused vaccination claim as much.
We disagree.
At the ACLU, we are not shy about defending civil liberties, even when they are very unpopular. But we see no civil liberties problem with requiring Covid-19 vaccines in most circumstances.
While the permissibility of requiring vaccines for particular diseases depends on several factors, when it comes to Covid-19, all considerations point in the same direction. The disease is highly transmissible, serious and often lethal; the vaccines are safe and effective; and crucially there is no equally effective alternative available to protect public health.
In fact, far from compromising civil liberties, vaccine mandates actually further civil liberties. They protect the most vulnerable among us, including people with disabilities and fragile immune systems, children too young to be vaccinated and communities of color hit hard by the disease.
Vaccine requirements also safeguard those whose work involves regular exposure to the public, like teachers, doctors and nurses, bus drivers and grocery store employees. And by inoculating people from the disease’s worst 
effects, the vaccines offer the promise of restoring to all of us our most basic liberties, eventually allowing us to return safely to life as we knew it, in schools and at houses of worship and political meetings, not to mention at restaurants, bars, and gatherings with family and friends.
Here’s why civil liberties objections to Covid vaccine mandates are generally unfounded.
Vaccines are a justifiable intrusion on autonomy and bodily integrity. That may sound ominous, because we all have the fundamental right to bodily integrity and to make our own health care decisions. But these rights are not absolute. They do not include the right to inflict harm on others.
While vaccine mandates are not always permissible, they rarely run afoul of civil liberties when they involve highly infectious and devastating diseases like Covid-19. Although this disease is novel, vaccine mandates are not. Schools, health care facilities, the U.S. military and many other institutions have long required vaccination for contagious diseases like mumps and measles that pose far less risk than the coronavirus does today.
In the United States alone, more than 39 million people have been infected with Covid-19 and more than 600,000 people have died. People with intellectual and physical disabilities are more likely to contract Covid-19, and they have much higher rates of hospitalization and death. Children’s hospitals in Georgia, Louisiana and other states are reporting high admissions of infected patients, and many are running out of beds.
Even though the F.D.A. and independent medical experts have found Covid-19 vaccines to be extremely safe and highly effective, a sizable portion of the eligible population has chosen not to be vaccinated. In this context, Covid-19 vaccine mandates — much like mask mandates — are public health measures necessary to protect people from severe illness and death. They are therefore permissible in many settings where the unvaccinated pose a risk to others, including schools and universities, hospitals, restaurants and bars, workplaces and businesses open to the public.
David Cole is the ACLU Legal Director. Daniel Mach is the Director of the ACLU Program on Freedom of Religion and Belief.
Fascinating.
I was on a zoom forum last night and half the people were never-vaxxers. And every one of them was left-leaning politically.
When will you all stop seeing this as a political issue. Larger majorities don’t matter – what matters is what individuals think. Many Republicans have been vaccinated; many Dems/Progressives have not, with the same vehement tone as the conservatives with the same vax views. That one has higher numbers doesn’t matter. This is not a right-left political issue – it’s vax/anti-vax. Period.
This virus is creating strange bed fellows.
Why is this being framed as a right/left issue when communities of color who historically vote Democrat are the least vaccinated?
“While White adults account for the largest share (57%) of unvaccinated adults, Black and Hispanic people remain less likely than their White counterparts to have received a vaccine. […] While these data provide helpful insights at a national level, to date, CDC is not publicly reporting state-level data on the racial/ethnic composition of people vaccinated.” Knight Family Foundation – 8/18/2021
Well actually New York has some data:
Requiring someone else to be vaccinated to protect you means the vaccine is not effective.
An effective vaccine is one that only needs to be applied to each person who wants protection.
To support civil liberties of people who cannot be vaccinated, a method is to have areas where everyone is voluntarily vaccinated.
The ACLU decision violates civil liberties more so than decisions that let people voluntarily self organize into vaccinated communities (while allowing communities with no such commitment to coexist).
“Requiring someone else to be vaccinated to protect you means the vaccine is not effective.”
Patently untrue… know of a couple of fully vaccinated people, who got the ‘delta strain’ from unvaccinated folk.
“An effective vaccine is one that only needs to be applied to each person who wants protection.”
Again, patently untrue… see above, plus all the history of effective vaccines (MMR, pertussis, seasonal flu, etc.), that were ‘compromised’ by those who CHOSE not to be vaccinated… brush up on your Biology, and/or history.
“To support civil liberties of people who cannot be vaccinated, a method is to have areas where everyone is voluntarily vaccinated.”
No one is pointing fingers at them… it is those who can, but choose not.
“The ACLU decision violates civil liberties more so than decisions that let people voluntarily self organize into vaccinated communities (while allowing communities with no such commitment to coexist).”
And you are the one who advocates that folk should only be able to own one residence (no violation of civil liberties there, ‘right’…)? For any purpose? Am thinking of a word that begins in “H”… to avoid censors, let’s pretend, “hollow”
Yes, ‘leper colonies’ have been somewhat effective in protecting the general population… goes to even ancient biblical times… I’d have no problem with those who can, but choose not to be vaccinated, do not want to mask or observe distancing in the proximity of others to go off and hang out together… form their own colonies… they can keep what you view as ‘civil liberties’ without infringement on ours, and survivors can feel free to share their experiences… much later.
There is no civil liberties violation when different cities have different rules on how many properties a person can own as long as people voluntarily join each city.
There is no civil liberties violation if different cities have different vaccination rules and people can choose.
That’s the same as having a vaccinated cruise ship and an unvaccinated one. It is up to the passenger to choose.
If the system does not support that, the fault is at the system not designed/tuned to support civil liberties. That is not a reason to lower the bar. You could only conclude that “that’s the amount of liberty our city offers” not “we don’t violate civil liberties”.
“Requiring someone else to be vaccinated to protect you means the vaccine is not effective.”
It’s not 100 percent effective. But it does greatly reduce the duration and severity of the illness however.
There are vulnerable populations.
The virus itself is more contagious than the previous strain and also causing greater risk to younger and more mobile populations.
Plus, kids under 12 are not getting vaccinated. So while my wife and I are vaccinated, our two younger kids are not.
Are you talking about a person who got the vaccine has less severe illness? Civil liberties allow each person to choose whether they want to get vaccinated for themselves. But not deciding that someone else must get vaccinated against their decision.
A private employer is free to mandate employees to get vaccinated, but not a public employer unless people can meaningfully opt out, which essentially turn the public entity into an optional organization where membership is voluntary.
If you use this reason to mandate vaccination, the logical wording is not that this mandate protects civil liberties of them, but that you are sacrificing civil liberties for others when you could have let each school decide whether it is a vaccinated school and let students choose the school environment.
City of Davis has instituted mandatory for city employees, effective Sept 1. City employees can ‘meaningfully opt out’ by resigning… being a City employee is voluntary.
How does that fit with your posit?
They may be ‘civil servants’, but they are NOT ‘civil slaves’…