People who talk about the legal precedent involved in
Jacobsen v. Massachusetts frequently don't understand what actually happened in that case.
Yes, Jacobsen refused the vaccine because he had had a horrific previous reaction. But his option was to pay a $5 fine. He took it all the way to the Supreme Court on principle, lost, and then paid the fine. He went back to his life, and was not shunned, didn't lose his employment, and was not restricted in society, as it should be....and very unlike the tyranny currently unfolding.
"The law at issue in
Jacobson did not impose a vaccine mandate. Rather, people who refused to receive the smallpox vaccine had to pay a $5 fine. (About
$150 in present-day value). And the failure to pay the fine would result in a jail sentence. But the state lacked the power to jab a syringe in the offender's arm. The
Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court observed, "
f a person should deem it important that vaccination should not be performed in his case, and the authorities should think otherwise, it is not in their power to vaccinate him by force, and the worst that could happen to him under the statute would be the payment of the penalty of $5."
"In short, the failure to comply with the mandate required the payment of a penalty. And being forced to pay a nominal fine does not invade any "fundamental right." This model resembles the Affordable Care Act, as construed by Chief Justice Roberts's saving construction in NFIB v. Sebelius. People are not mandated to purchase insurance; rather, those who fail to purchase insurance must pay a tax-penalty"
Jacobson v. Massachusetts did not uphold the state's power to mandate vaccinations.
