COVID rule about bars, not barred

Originally published by David Coale.

Louisiana bar owners contended that a state COVID restriction violated the Equal Protection Clause. The Fifth Circuit disagreed:

“Unlike AG-permitted bars whose primary purpose is to serve alcohol, AR-permitted businesses must serve more food than alcohol to meet their monthly revenue requirements. Even if the Bar Closure Order’s classifications are based solely on the premise that venues whose primary purpose and revenue are driven by alcohol sales rather than food sales are more likely to increase the spread of COVID-19, such a rationale, as described by Dr. Billioux and the Governor and credited by both district courts, is sufficiently ‘plausible’ and not ‘irrational.”’ … [T]he Bar Closure Order’s differential treatment of bars operating with AG permits is at least rationally related to reducing the spread of COVID-19 in higher-risk environments.”

Big Tyme Investments, LLC v. Edwards, No. 20-30526 (Jan. 13, 2021) (citations omitted). The panel majority and a concurrence disputed the exact import of archaic-sounding language from Jacobson v. Massachusetts, 197 U.S. 11 (1905), but did not find it to materially impact the outcome under traditional Equal Protection principles.

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