Ferret McDuff commented on the legal grounds to resist surrendering their
ferrets for rabies testing:
 
>What about the Constitutional right to due process which guarantees that
>no governmental agency (even the mighty public health) can deprive any
>citizen of their private property (which includes livestock, working
>animals, pets and other domestic creatures) without going through very
>prescribed steps to insure that the action is correct?
 
Yow!  Turn down the contrast on your monitor, dude!  You've managed to view
a discussion that I took pains to paint in elusive shades of gray as stark
black and white.  Before you go thumping your copy of the Constitution you
should know that lots of Constitutional "rights" are not absolute, like
shouting "Fire!" in a crowded theater.  In the area of search and seizure,
any law enforcement authority has the right to dispense with due process if
there is reason to suspect that a life may be saved.  Thus, if I'm pulled
over by a state trooper for having a burnt-out tail light, if the officer
hears muffled cries and pounding from the trunk of my car, he can force me
to open the trunk or restrain me in whatever way reasonable to take my keys
to open it himself.  No warrant is needed.  It's 100% legal.  Ask any lawyer.
 
>...even in matters of public health and the public welfare, [public
>health officials] are not omnipotent and DO have to follow the same
>rules as any other less powerful governmetal agency.
 
In a non-emergency, yes, but when the health of another human or the entire
community is at risk, public health officials have authority that can bypass
due process.  That was the whole point of my previous post.  A misinformed,
pressured or malevolent person *could*--at risk of being censured later--
invoke his or her authority in emergency situations to seize a ferret
without a warrent.  I would happily testify in court that rabies does not
qualify as such an emergency but I see members of my own profession as well
as the media magnify rabies into something like Ebola Zaire.
 
In response to Judith's query about legal grounds to resist surrendering
ferrets I wanted to make a point that the laws ARE NOT absolute.  (That's
one olf those gray things I was talking about.) Clutching the Constitution
to your bosom and going down in a blaze of glory won't change that.  And
this member of "the mighty public health" (I may put that on my business
cards--I kinda like it!) *supports* the ability of public health officials
to override the Constitution in *genuine* emergencies.  And those
emergencies DO exist--I also subscribe to a list-server for emerging
infectious disease (a la "Outbreak"-- the movie) and public health folks
around the planet head off real, live emergencies all the time that could
leave many, many people or animals dead.  The authority that public health
officials have in emergencies can never be taken completely away, so there
is always going to be a small chance that someone will abuse that authority.
Like Prometheus and the flame, the choice is not to abandon fire altogether,
but to make certain it is always used safely.  Knowing and demanding your
rights *is* wonderful advice, and can give folks time to think about any
decision to kill/test or quarantine/observe.  BUT, that won't always work.
In the worst scenario, your rights can--legally-- be overridden.  THAT is
why I advocated educating public health officials *and* the public, to
minimize the chance that anyone will feel pressured to seize a ferret.
 
If you'd stop to recognize public health officials as
uninformed-yet-teachable human beings rather than the jack-booted thugs you
paint them to be, you might find that you can sway a few of them to our side.
 
--Jeff (I-don't-even-wear-boots) Johnston ([log in to unmask])
[Posted in FML issue 1718]