Lawmakers: Don’t meddle with private businesses.

Who will be targeted next week?

“This bill goes against all the advice of every trusted medical expert of both the state and the federal government.”

—the president of the state Chamber of Commerce

WHY, THAT’S just another reason to pass the bill! These days, experts aren’t just suspicious characters; they must be actively opposed. One could be forgiven for thinking that some Arkansas lawmakers would pour water into their diesel tractor’s fuel tank if a pointy-headed mechanic told them it would lead to disaster. What does that mechanic know? I saw something on the Internet!

It’s hard to blame Arkansas lawmakers for being frustrated. They tried to rule from Little Rock that all schools throughout Arkansas could not require masks in classrooms—even in districts where the virus is boiling over—but a court put a hold on their medical opinions. So now certain lawmakers have decided to take on private business. And in America, when you take on private business, you are a part of a target-rich environment. Because they’re all over.

During a committee hearing early last week, legislators “approved the study of a bill that would prohibit employers from requiring the disclosure of an employee’s vaccination status.” Which would result in businesses not being able to require vaccines for workers. Which was the point. Rachel Herzog’s 1A story said the action was taken although some of the state’s most prominent business leaders said vaccine requirements should be business-by-business, business-to-business decisions.

It appears as though some lawmakers are selective in their thoughts about limited government. Because certain legislators seem more than willing to sic the government on schools, businesses, and perhaps any other entity that gets between them and publicity.

Somebody once said that you can no more embarrass a sitting politician than you can a sofa. But you’d think that after the state Chamber of Commerce, Tyson Foods, and other Arkansas suit-andtie types had their say, that lawmakers would have backed down on this one.

Instead, Senate Bill 719 would “create a state-recognized right to privacy” for vaccination status. We’d like to talk to some of these lawmakers about the right of privacy and their thoughts on certain court decisions concerning abortion.

But it’d have to be a Zoom meeting. The latest covid variant has shut down a lot of in-person stuff. Again.

Here’s a bit of reality for our betters in the General Assembly: The government can mandate vaccinations. If they’d just ask a lawyer, or a first-year law student, they could get a lesson on

Jacobson v. Massachusetts. The state can mandate vaccinations or make a body pay a fine. It’s settled law. (Not that the political environment right now would allow the state or the feds to do such a thing; but the option is there for the future.)

And if the government can mandate vaccinations on private citizens, certainly private businesses—with their own responsibilities to other employees and customers—can expect a hired worker to get vaccinated, or for that worker to find another job. Employers can ask workers whether they smoke. And can test for dope. These things pass constitutional muster. So would a question about a vaccine against a deadly virus killing people all across the country and world.

Here are some of the headlines from the last week. And only ones from this paper:

Hospitalized, ventilator counts up

For 2nd day, patient tallies top records

Shortage of medics crippling hospitals

State hospitals hit with 1,376 covid patients

After record admissions, ICUs down to last 8 beds

Records set 3rd day; cases up 2,940

UA System backs campus mask rules

But certain Arkansas lawmakers, not content in ignoring the problem, would actively keep others from the fight. We can only assume this isn’t as much ignorance as self-interested grandstanding, an effort to keep from being “primaried” from the right—the nightmare scenario for too many in the Arkansas General Assembly.

Normally such swaggering and posturing isn’t deadly. But when it comes to covid and legal obstruction, swaggering and posturing could be.

So let’s not. And, at the same time, keep free enterprise free and private business decisions with private businesses. It’s the American way.