Jacobson v. Massachusetts

Jacobson v. Massachusetts
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued December 6, 1904 Decided February 20, 1905
Full case name	Henning Jacobson, plaintiff in error v. Commonwealth of Massachusetts
Citations	197 U.S. 11 (more) 25 S. Ct. 358, 49 L. Ed. 643, 1905 U.S. LEXIS 1232
Case history
Prior	Defendant convicted, Third District Court of Eastern Middlesex (1902); judgment affirmed, Commonwealth v. Henning Jacobson, 183 Mass 242 (1903)
Holding
The police power of a state must be held to embrace at least such reasonable regulations established directly by legislative enactment to protect public health and safety.
Court membership
Chief Justice Melville Fuller Associate Justices John M. Harlan · David J. Brewer Henry B. Brown · Edward D. White Rufus W. Peckham · Joseph McKenna Oliver W. Holmes Jr. · William R. Day
Case opinions
Majority	Harlan, joined by Fuller, Brown, White, McKenna, Holmes, Day
Dissent	Brewer
Dissent	Peckham

Jacobson v. Massachusetts, 197 U.S. 11 (1905), was a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court upheld the authority of states to enforce compulsory vaccination laws. The Court's decision articulated the view that individual liberty is not absolute and is subject to the police power of the state. Jacobson has been invoked in numerous other Supreme Court cases as an example of a baseline exercise of the police power.