“The Wisconsin Supreme Court declined to take up a conservative legal group’s challenge to Dane County’s mask mandate in a 4-3 ruling issued Friday afternoon,” reports Madison.com. “The court refused to exercise its own jurisdiction over the recent public health order, instead leaving it up to the state’s lower courts to consider any future legal challenges first.”

“The Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty challenged the mask mandate in a lawsuit on behalf of Sun Prairie resident Bryant Stempski against Dane County and Madison, their joint public health department, and the department’s director, Janel Heinrich, asking the court to “declare the relevant county and city ordinances unconstitutional,” according to court documents.”

“The four justices in the majority did not provide further elaboration on the court’s order. The three dissenting justices, all conservatives, argued the court had refused its responsibility to determine “what the law is” and what authority public health officials have to issue compulsory mandates.”

Actually, the three conservative justices are completely wrong. The National Preparedness and Response, Leadership, Organization, and Planning Act is a Federal Law that grants the Federal Government the authority to establish counter-measures to prevent the spread of infectious disease, and states and local governments already have authority to decide that they will ally themselves with the Federal Government to implement measures recommended by the CDC and NIH to prevent the spread of pandemic illnesses.

Read the full decision here.