> The precedent you are looking for is about the legal principles that limit the extent to which the government can prevent free travel, not quarantine per se.

> The precedent you are looking for is about the legal principles that limit the extent to which the government can prevent free travel, not quarantine per se. Quarantine must conform to that precedent As you noted, the highest level of judicial scrutiny for constitutionally protected rights (like the freedom of speech) is strict scrutiny. That doesn't mean the government is unable to restrict those rights, but it generally means that the Government's regulations must meet the following criteria: 1. is necessary to a "compelling state interest"; 2. that the law is "narrowly tailored" to achieving this compelling purpose; 3. and that the law uses the "least restrictive means" to achieve the purpose. From all the descriptions of precedent around quarantine laws that I've seen, the judiciary was extremely deferential to Government decision making during a bona-fide epidemic. Given that, I think a reasonable travel regulation to implement a regional quarantine would easily survive such scrutiny. 1. "compelling state interest" - maintaining the public health has long been held to be a compelling state interest. 2. "narrowly tailored" - if the regional quarantine was restricted to bona-fide epidemic outbreaks, and backed up by epidemiological experts, I think the courts will accept this. I think this is the criteria that the drafting will have to be most carefully tailored around. 3. "least restricted means" - I think the Governments have been demonstrating that they have been actively trying all the other less restrictive means, and they haven't been effective. Based on this, I find it extremely unlikely that a court would rule against a regional lockdown quarantine. In saying there was significant precedent against it, I was hoping you had something related to epidemiological outbreaks and public health quarantines. I find the argument that the courts have generally been skeptical of travel restriction to be quite unpersuasive. I don't think courts will view this as a "typical" travel restriction, and will give local / state / federal governments a lot of leeway in responding to this kind of an outbreak.