Will we be forced to take a COVID vaccine?

Should the government – local, state or federal – have the power to force anyone to be vaccinated?

That's a good question, and assuming President Trump is right and a COVID-19 vaccine is developed, the answer may be forced upon us – and I fear, due to the panic stoked by many regarding this virus, a mandate may follow.

Then it's just a matter of whether a vaccine edict trumps our "unalienable rights," granted us "by our Creator," of "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness," and whether "Governments are [really] instituted among Men, to secure these rights," or merely to order us around.

We don't need to look hard to find examples of what may be in store.

There was an outbreak of the measles in New York in October 2018. Local affiliate WABC reported that there had been 214 confirmed cases in Brooklyn and Queens and another 153 in Rockland County.

Because of this, Rockland County instituted mandatory vaccinations. Rockland County Executive Ed Day announced that non-vaccinated minors were then barred from public places.

As of March 28, 2019, it was said: "Anyone who is under 18 years of age and is not vaccinated against the measles is prohibited from public places until the declaration expires in 30 days or until they receive the MMR vaccination."

MMR stands for the combination vaccine for Measles, Mumps and Rubella (German measles).

So again, should government have the power to force anyone to be vaccinated?

As a freedom- and liberty-loving, small-government constitutionalist, one would naturally think I would be against such mandates. And you'd be right.

In cases like this, I always defer to Thomas Jefferson's rule of liberty: "If it neither breaks my leg nor picks my pocket, what difference is it to me?"

In other words, if your diseased child doesn't negatively affect me or my family, it isn't my problem.

The science is all there. Any parent can research the safety and warnings of vaccines and make an educated decision to vaccinate their children and themselves, or not. This may seem rather selfish, but that's the price of freedom, and your stupidity and fear shall not trump my liberty.

The decision should be left to the people, who are ultimately responsible for themselves and their children.

However, in our modern-day, enlightened, it takes a village society, government nannies can't stand that our liberty should trump "public" safety.

How about another, more egregious example?

Just months after the Brooklyn and Rockland outbreaks, a family suffered an armed incursion in Arizona. In March 2019, in the dead of night, a police SWAT team stormed the house under direction of the Arizona Department of Child Safety (DCS).

Evidently a mother took her sick child to the doctor, after the 2-year-old child had registered a fever above 100. "The doctor told her to take him to the emergency room, fearing that because the boy was unvaccinated, perhaps he had meningitis, a life-threatening disease."

The doctor then called the hospital and told personnel there to expect the child. The mother took the child home. He started to feel better, and his fever was going down. All looked well. The mother even took the time to call the doctor with the good news, but he was not satisfied, still insisting that she take her kid to the emergency room.

The mother had the nerve to think it was her decision to care for her own child. Silly mother. Of course not. You're only the parent! The doctor called DCS, who then called the police.

DCS proceeded to obtain a temporary child custody order for not just the "sick" child, who was no longer sick, but the woman's other two children. The police then raided the house, guns a blazing, snatched the kids and left. The mother was powerless to do anything.

Lest you forgot, this was not in North Korea, but Arizona.

Is this what we have to look forward to should a COVID-19 vaccination be mandated?

America – Home of the Free.

Right.