The pandemic has brought the latest battle in the long American war over communal well-being.
The tension between individual freedom and community well being is at the heart of community rights. Ibram X. Kendi’s opinion piece in the Atlantic tackles the topic.
Kendi writes:
“From the beginning of the American project, the powerful individual has been battling for his constitutional freedom to harm, and the vulnerable community has been battling for its constitutional freedom from harm. Both freedoms were inscribed into the U.S. Constitution, into the American psyche. The history of the United States, the history of Americans, is the history of reconciling the unreconcilable: individual freedom and community freedom. There is no way to reconcile the enduring psyche of the slaveholder with the enduring psyche of the enslaved.”
Read the full article, published in the Atlantic May 4, 2020 here.
A question for us all to consider is why doesn’t a local government have the right to enact and enforce policies that protect residents from the possible health risks from the Coronavirus? After all, local governments are closest and most responsive to constituents.