Caseflicks

Supreme Court of the United States • 1922

Zucht v. King

260 U.S. 174 | 43 S. Ct. 24 | 67 L. Ed. 194 | 1922 U.S. LEXIS 2356

Full access

Unlock the video and quiz

The written brief is free to read below. Subscribe to watch the video explainer and take the quiz.

Create an account Log in

Takeaway

In short, Zucht v. King held that established vaccination precedents made the ordinance's validity too insubstantial for review by writ of error, while a claim of discriminatory enforcement had to be pursued, if at all, through certiorari.

Background

San Antonio ordinances required anyone seeking to attend a public school or other place of education to present a vaccination certificate. City officials excluded Rosalyn Zucht from both public and private schools after she declined vaccination and could not provide the required certificate.

Zucht sued the officials in Texas state court. She alleged that no circumstances justified vaccination at the time, that the ordinances effectively compelled vaccination without due process, and that they gave the Board of Health unguided discretion that invited partiality and oppression. She also alleged discriminatory enforcement. She sought an injunction, mandamus requiring her admission to public school, and damages.

The trial court sustained a general demurrer and dismissed the complaint when Zucht declined to amend. The Texas Court of Civil Appeals affirmed, and the Texas Supreme Court denied review. The case reached the Supreme Court on a writ of error.

Issues

Issue #1

Whether Zucht's Fourteenth Amendment challenge to the validity of San Antonio's vaccination ordinances presented a substantial federal question that could support review by writ of error.

Holding

No. Earlier Supreme Court decisions had already made the ordinances' asserted constitutional defects insubstantial.

Reasoning

Although a municipal ordinance counts as a state law for purposes of Supreme Court review, the Court must dismiss a writ of error when the federal constitutional question is not substantial. Formal invocation of the Fourteenth Amendment is not enough to establish jurisdiction.

Jacobson v. Massachusetts had already established that a state may, under its police power, require compulsory vaccination. Thus, Zucht's claim that the school-attendance requirement effectively compelled vaccination did not present an open due-process question.

Prior cases also established that a state may delegate to municipalities the authority to decide when public-health regulations should operate and may permit local officials broad discretion in applying and enforcing health laws. The ordinances therefore did not become constitutionally suspect merely because the Board of Health had discretion over their enforcement.

The equal protection argument against the ordinances likewise lacked substance. In the exercise of the police power, government may make reasonable classifications, and a regulation need not apply to every person or setting in order to satisfy equal protection. Unlike the arbitrary licensing power condemned in Yick Wo v. Hopkins, the discretion here was of the kind needed to protect public health.

Issue #2

Whether Zucht's allegation that officials discriminatorily administered an otherwise valid vaccination ordinance could be reviewed by the Supreme Court on writ of error.

Holding

No. The allegation raised a substantial constitutional claim, but it challenged the unconstitutional exercise of valid authority rather than the validity of the ordinance or the officials' authority itself; absent another basis for jurisdiction, it was reviewable only by certiorari.

Reasoning

The Court acknowledged that allegations of discriminatory enforcement can present a substantial equal-protection question. Zucht's complaint therefore was not frivolous insofar as it charged that officials had singled her out or otherwise administered the ordinance unequally.

But the claim did not attack the validity of the ordinance or deny that officials possessed authority to enforce it. Instead, it alleged that officials exercised concededly valid authority in an unconstitutional manner.

A writ of error did not permit Supreme Court review of that fact-bound challenge unless the case was otherwise properly before the Court. Such claims could instead be considered through the Court's discretionary certiorari jurisdiction. Because no substantial challenge to the ordinance itself supported the writ, the Court dismissed it.