On March 13, 2020, the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services officially declared a national public health emergency in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Since then, an increasing number of states have instituted curfews, stay-at-home orders and other emergency measures to help stop the spread of the novel coronavirus. But those actions also raise questions about civil rights and constitutional liberties in the midst of a public health crisis.

The last major global pandemic that caused damage on the scale of the current crisis was the 1918 flu pandemic, which infected about a third of the world population and killed about 50 million people worldwide, including about 675,000 in the United States, as University of Texas Law School professor Stephen Vladeck told WNYC's Jami Floyd.

"The precedents that we have suggest that governments get a fair amount of discretion in these circumstances," said Vladeck. "But it's been a long time since the Supreme Court ever had a case that raised this kind of question, and it's never has a case that raised it at a nationwide level."

According to Vladeck, a specialist in federal jurisdiction, constitutional law and national security, it comes down to several issues, including the balance between state and federal powers, and what qualifies as a constitutional right. 

"If a city wanted to say that our parks are only open from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., I'm not sure that there would be an especially compelling argument that we have a constitutional right to go to the park at 9 p.m.," Vladeck said. "It gets messier when we start talking about religious observation, because that's where the ground shifts from just a general right to enjoy the outdoors to a specific right to free exercise of religion."

For the full conversation, click "Listen."

The Docket is our series in which WNYC’s All Things Considered host Jami Floyd takes a deep dive into the American legal system.