The Governor of Minnesota designated the COVID-19 as an “act of nature”, declared the peacetime emergency and, on this basis, enacted an executive order that required Minnesotans to wear face coverings.
During the pandemic, the Governor of Minnesota issued a declaration of a peacetime emergency under the Minnesota Emergency Management Act of 1996 (hereinafter, “the Act”), which authorizes the Governor to issue such a declaration only if “an act of nature, a technological failure or malfunction, a terrorist incident, an industrial accident, a hazardous materials accident or a civil disturbance endangers life and property and local government resources are inadequate to handle the situation”.
The Governor designated the COVID-19 as an “act of nature”, declared the peacetime emergency and, on this basis, enacted an executive order that required Minnesotans to wear face coverings. A number of Minnesota residents, business and churches filed suit alleging that the Governor’s declaration of a peacetime emergency in response to a public-health emergency exceeded his powers under the Act and that the face-covering mandate violated their constitutional rights. Inter alia, they alleged that a public-health emergency as the COVID-19 pandemic is not an act of nature.
By judgment of 10 July 2023, the Court of Appeals of Minnesota – to which the Minnesota Supreme Court had remanded the case to solve the issue of the Governor’s authority to declare the peacetime emergency under the Act – dismissed plaintiffs’ claims and concluded that the Act authorized the Governor to declare a peacetime emergency based on a public -health emergency such as the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Court held that treating the COVID-19 pandemic as an act of nature was consistent with the definition of “act of God” contained in the Law dictionary; “an unexpected and uncontrollable event caused by a naturally occurring virus falls within the (dictionary) phrase’s broad scope”, the Court found. The Court further noted that the legislative history of the Act indicated that the Legislature intended to adopt an “all hazards” approach and that, under that approach, the pandemic could certainly constitute an act of nature.
As to the plaintiffs’ argument that the COVID-19 virus most likely originated from a laboratory leak and did not occur naturally, the Court held that it could not be required to identify whether “any human action had contributed at all to naturally occurring forces or events” since this question would “prove impossible to resolve” and such a requirement “did not appear in the statute”.
Reference: Snell v. Walz, Court of Appeals of Minnesota, 10 July 2023.
