Is 'Lockdown' in U.S. Law?

A Substack Notes exchange with Katherine Watt

I don’t love the word ‘lockdown’.

I used to be fine with it, but sometime in 2023, the term started to bother me, to the point I asked an editor to remove it from a headline he’d given my republished article.¹ I spelled out some of my sentiments about the term last year in this reaction to remarks made by Scott Atlas.

Yesterday, I put the question of whether ‘lockdown’ appears anywhere in the federal or state statutes to legal researcher

Katherine Watt

, after skimming her publication Book 3 - Communicable disease control, quarantine, habeas corpus law.

Communicable disease control, quarantine and habeas corpus; 42 USC 264, 42 CFR 70, 42 CFR 71

Our exchange follows — including my characteristic tangents.

Jessica Hockett

Katherine Watt

I skimmed Book 3 and this bailiwicknewsarchives.f… Can you confirm that the word “lockdown” does not appear in any part of the U.S. communicable disease code or any other formal/legal document applicable to control of communicable diseases?

Also, am I correct in saying there is no explicit provision which allows federal or local officials to declare an emergency and tell everyone to “stay home, save lives” because some seen or unseen disease is ‘spreading’ or “out there”?

Katherine Watt

As far as I know, the word “lockdown” does not appear in federal or state laws. I may not have found it yet in federal laws, or the act may be there as a different word or phrase, such as “detention” in the home or in facilities (hospitals, nursing homes, prisons) under quarantine and isolation laws and regulations.

I haven’t looked at all state laws, but I anticipate that they each have something similar to orders of detention at home or in facilities. In Pennsylvania state law, the phrase is “control the ingress and egress to and from a disaster area, the movement of persons within the area and the occupancy of premises therein.”

I think all of the actions that state and federal officers took and will take during future declared emergencies under the phrase “stay home, save lives” fall under these general, open-ended provisions in federal and state laws.

For example: “the [HHS] Secretary may take such action as may be appropriate to respond to the public health emergency, including making grants, providing awards for expenses, and entering into contracts and conducting and supporting investigations into the cause, treatment, or prevention of a disease or disorder” [42 USC 247d(a)].

This provision is combined with HHS Secretary’s Congressionally-authorized, unilateral authority to determine or declare — also general, open-ended, no evidence required — that there “is a public health emergency or significant potential for a public health emergency” [21 USC 360bbb-3(b)(1)(C)]; that “an agent…can cause serious or life threatening disease or condition;” [21 USC 360bbb-3(c)(1)]; “that a disease or other health condition or other threat to health constitutes a public health emergency, or that there is a credible risk that the disease, condition, or threat may in the future constitute such an emergency,” [42 USC 247d-6d(b)(1)]; that designated actors (program planners, qualified persons as defined in the law, which includes everyone in the countermeasure supply and use chain) “shall not have engaged in "willful misconduct" as a matter of law where such program planner or qualified person acted consistent with applicable directions, guidelines, or recommendations by the Secretary [42 USC 247d-6d(c)(4)] and on and on.

The HHS Secretary’s credibility assessments of the threats are the only legally relevant credibility assessments that can occur, because of the blocking of judicial review, Congressional review, and state laws under 42 USC 247d-6d(b)(7), (b)(8) and (b)(9).

Combined, all those general, open-ended, no-evidence-required, no-evidentiary-standards, no-evidentiary-review-process, all-inclusive provisions provide legal authority for any and all actions that the Secretary performs, recommends, or otherwise causes to occur lower down the chain of command in the federal government, and in the state, local and tribal authorities — called “authorities having jurisdiction” — to whom the authorities and liability immunities are delegated or extended or applied.

State laws have similar provisions, placing the general, open-ended, no-evidence-required authority to respond in the hands of the state governors and health officials.

For example, in Pennsylvania, the governor’s “Order…for Individuals to Stay at Home” were issued under provisions of 1955 Disease Prevention and Control Law,1978 Emergency Management Services (EMS) Code, and related emergency powers laws addressing disaster response, on the model of Three Mile Island nuclear contamination incidents and geographically-designated disaster areas, but applying it in terms of presumptive, asymptomatic contamination of all Pennsylvania residents with the invisible, allegedly-transmissible virus, and limiting the movement of the contaminated physical space: living human beings.

The PA governor’s order dated March 23, 2020 stated that he had “proclaimed the existence of a disaster emergency” pursuant to 35 Pa. C.S. § 7301(c) (part of the law adopted in 1978), and included in the clauses, “in addition to general powers, during a disaster emergency I am authorized specifically to control ingress and egress to and from a disaster area and the movement of persons within it and the occupancy of premises therein.” 35 Pa. C.S. § 7301(f). The PA health secretary’s order, also dated March 23, 2020, cited implementing regulation “28 Pa. Code §§ 27.60- 27.68 (relating to disease control measures; isolation; quarantine; movement of persons subject to isolation or quarantine; and release from isolation and quarantine).” https://www.mbm-law.net/wp-content/uploads/03_23_20-Stay-at-Home-Order-and-SOH-Stay-at-Home-Order.pdf

Jessica Hockett

Thank you very much.

In 2023, I became very uncomfortable with the term ‘lockdown,’ because I realized it has no legal meaning and is a term of propaganda. Before 2020, I mostly associated ‘lockdown’ - and its cousin ‘shelter in place’ - with two places: prisons and schools, i.e., An inmate is missing and the State Penitentiary is on lockdown or West Side Elementary locked down for two hours this morning after receiving a bomb threat. Highly temporal, actual-emergency situations in specific buildings or quadrants.

Active shooter, unstable patient on the loose, robbers holding up a bank a la that epic scene in the 1995 movie Heat, actual chemical spills - these are scenarios in which the notion of locking down an area by keeping people in or out until a clear and present danger passes is reasonable. The concept has not ever and will not ever make sense as applied to an invisible illness.

Looking back, it’s easier to see the advent of ‘lockdown’ in the public consciousness via coordinated propaganda in January 2020+ (See under “China Locking Down” Psy-Op)

January 2020: The "China is lying about coronavirus cases and deaths" and "China is locking down" psy-ops

The Gov of Illinois’ emergency declaration invoked similar statutes as the Gov of PA. Unsurprisingly, IL and PA seem to have the same “emergency management” laws. ilga.gov/legislation/il…

I reviewed all of these statutes, and the IL communicable disease code (which underwent significant revision in 2014, in the wake of the fake Ebola crisis) when I was writing letters to various officials and making arguments against compelled masking (e.g., woodhouse76.com/p/quest…) and violations of extant quarantine laws.

I agree that “all of the actions that state and federal officers took and will take during future declared emergencies under the phrase ‘stay home, save lives’ fall under these general, open-ended provisions in federal and state laws” and think you would concur that a number the provisions put into place before or long before 2020 — federally and in certain states — were done so intentionally and in anticipation of a pandemic/bioterrorism event (much to the delight of the various ‘preparedness’ industries).

Note how Illinois law defines a “public health emergency”

"Public health emergency" means an occurrence or imminent threat of an illness or health condition that:

(a) is believed to be caused by any of the following:

(i) bioterrorism;

(ii) the appearance of a novel or previously controlled or eradicated infectious agent or biological toxin;

(iii) a natural disaster;

(iv) a chemical attack or accidental release; or

(v) a nuclear attack or accident; and

(b) poses a high probability of any of the following harms:

(i) a large number of deaths in the affected population;

(ii) a large number of serious or long-term disabilities in the affected population; or

(iii) widespread exposure to an infectious or toxic agent that poses a significant risk of substantial future harm to a large number of people in the affected population.

You’re correct that state and federal statutes don’t require anyone to prove a threat exists in order to declare an emergency, control people’s movements, etc. I fail to see how any of it is Constitutional (5th and 14th amendment violations).

It seems like if it could be shown that officials had knowledge that this “infectious agent” wasn’t “imminent” (had been ‘around’ or ‘in humans already’) or novel or infectious or “spreading” or didn’t pose a risk to anyone, it could help “un-do” the emergency declarations. INAL, obviously — just fantasizing! 😊

P.S. FYI, the lawsuit that was eventually successful in Illinois re: compelled masking for school attendance took advantage of a section of the Comm Disease code that says masking is a form of modified quarantine and requires the county health department to issue an order to the individual, which is subject to the recipient’s objection/due process rights.

I made a ‘dress code’ argument and, on a personal level, was able to free my son from compelled masking at his private school with a religious objections, but was unsuccessful with my daughter in the public system. For me, the highest/best arguments from a ‘religious’ standpoint pose and address the question of who has authority over the body and in what circumstances.

Religious Objections to a School Mask Mandate

Katherine has posted both my question and her response on

Bailiwick News

. I defer to her legal expertise, as I have no formal legal training, which my bio makes clear.

Authorization 'to control ingress and egress to and from a disaster area, the movement of persons within the area and the occupancy of premises therein'

1. He obliged — a noble concession given the title of his book: Life After Lockdown.