Norman has taken to the pages . . . er bytes of TexasGOPVote to explain why he is challenging the Governor's Executive Orders.
I am one of hundreds and soon to be thousands of plaintiffs in a lawsuit against Governor Greg Abbott.
As most of you know, I have always supported Greg Abbott, long before he became Governor. I am also an opponent of lawsuit abuse. I don't like to be involved in a lawsuit, as a plaintiff or as a defendant. So it is natural that you would wonder why I am suing the Governor of Texas.
The bottom line is that I believe that the government-imposed "lockdown" put in place by our city, county, and state officials is worse than the disease we are fighting against. Politicians across the country have taken extreme measures based on flawed "models" that have been subject to revision after revision. But the extreme shutdown tactics are still in place! They have adopted a one-size-fits-all response to an epidemic that has hit different parts of the country in very different ways. As a result they have created an economic crisis that will lead to another public health crisis that could be far worse than COVID-19.
To make matters worse, our leaders have done this in violation of the Texas Constitution! Governor Abbott's orders are based on a 1975 statute that purports to grant certain powers to suspend laws in the state of Texas. This is a clear violation of the Texas Constitution's prohibition against any person or entity having the authority to suspend laws other than the Texas Legislature, requiring a two thirds majority of the Legislature, and a majority vote of Texas voters.
I applaud the fact that the Governor has announced that he wants us to open back up. That is the right thing to do. I also acknowledge that our Governor is leading other governors to make the same move and that he has avoided some of the more draconian shut-down orders in other states. These are needed corrections.
So, why sue now? Won't this all be irrelevant once Texas is open for business again?
I am concerned about the next time. Our leaders need to know that Texans will not stand for suspension of our constitutional rights. We cannot endure this kind of shutdown disaster again. Our leaders need to go back to the drawing board about how to fight a pandemic while keeping our economy as open as possible. Finally, they need to do it in a way that is constitutional!
Here is a link to my interview with Channel 2 news. Please watch it.
Feel free to forward this blog post with the link.
God bless you and may He lead us out of the wilderness.
Well. Norman has received a lot of responses about his interview and this explanation. Most of them have been positive, but not all. We have heard from customers whose doors are now shut and they are going through mass layoffs. We have heard from people who have missed two paychecks and are about to miss a third one. They desperately want to get back to work. We have heard from people who have actually had COVID-19 and DO NOT want anyone else to get it.
We are hopeful that this debate will continue and we will reach an appropriate proportional mean on dealing with these sorts of pandemics in the future. The good news is that they seem pretty rare.
One thing is becoming clear, we are only beginning to understand the ramifications and long-lasting consequences of shuttering an economy the size and scale of the United States. The effects will not simply be higher unemployment and an oil glut. Putting it in war terms, mass lockdowns are akin to fighting a war with nukes. It pretty much guarantees that your enemy will be annihilated, but surviving the fallout takes its own toll. We need to find a better way to fight the war.
