United States of America and the pandemic: issues of legal regulation in combating COVID-19

Abstract

The pandemic period in the United States has become a test of the strength of many state mechanisms, raised the question of the limits of the extraordinary powers of the President and governors and effectiveness of the public health system. The reasons why one of the most prosperous countries in the world has become the most affected state by the pandemic largely lie in the sphere of public administration system and historically established precedents for expanding the powers of the executive branch in times of emergency. The aim of the study is to identify the foundations of constitutional and legal regulation in combating the consequences of the pandemic in the United States and to trace correlations between peculiarities of distribution of powers in the field of public security and effectiveness of measures to counter the COVID-19 spread. One of the tasks is to identify both advantages and disadvantages of the US political structure in the context of countering the nationwide threat. The historical method of research allowed to determine the specifics of the extraordinary powers of the US President, while the specific legal method was used as the basis for analyzing the structure and powers of legislative and executive authorities along with comparative legal, system-structural and functional approaches. In the fight against the pandemic, the mechanism of public administration in the United States has shown its inability to counter threats of a nationwide nature. In many ways, this situation is explained by peculiarities of the legislative regulation of the healthcare sector, transferred to the autonomous regulation of state authorities, a disparate system of legal regulation of emergency response, as well as the very modest capabilities of the head of state in responding to epidemiological threats. The study allows to conclude that there is a correlation between the features of the public administration system in the United States, its legislative regulation and the negative consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic caused by uncoordinated actions of federal and regional government authorities.