The COVID Project
The record
- Jurisdiction
- North Carolina
- Level
- Court
- Authority
- N.C.G.S. 7A-31; N.C. Const. art. I, secs. 1, 19; G.S. 166A-19.30, 166A-19.31, 166A-19.73
- Issued
- 2025-08-22 Aug. 22, 2025
- Effective
- 2025-08-22
- End
- n/a (judicial opinion)
- In force
- Aug. 22, 2025 (no end date recorded; counted as in force for 120 days)
- Limitation types
- Business closureAlcohol and barsOther
- Addressees
- specified businesses (bars and private clubs closed or restricted by EO 118 through EO 209); by its construction of the Act, every business establishment
- Character
- adjudication
- Collection
- Standing duties: North Carolina DUT-NC
Operative words
the Emergency Management Act... grants the Governor the ability to impose significant restrictions or prohibitions on otherwise permissible activity during states of emergency... [and] allows the Governor to restrict "the operation of offices, business establishments, and other places to or from which people may travel or at which they may congregate"
Penalty
As construed: the Act's prohibitions and restrictions bind without compensation; violation is a Class 2 misdemeanor (G.S. 166A-19.30(d))
What it required
States, as the Supreme Court's construction of the Act, that the Governor's COVID-19 executive orders restricting bar operations were exercises of statutory power to prohibit and restrict the operation of business establishments (G.S. 166A-19.31(b)(2), (5) through G.S. 166A-19.30(c)) and that the Act provides compensation only for property 'commandeered, seized, taken, condemned, or otherwise used', not for restrictions on use; on the constitutional claims the Court modified and affirmed in part the Court of Appeals on the fruits-of-labor claim (remanding for discovery), reversed on equal protection (rational basis applies) and affirmed on the statutory claims. Character as recorded: adjudication (order_penalty layer).
Retrieval noteCite for the Court's description of the Act and of the orders as binding restrictions on business operation; the constitutional rulings (colorable fruits-of-labor claim remanded; rational basis on equal protection) concern the bars' remedies against the State and post-date the quarters.