Individual liberty is not absolute, and a state's police power must be held to embrace at least such reasonable regulations established directly by legislative enactment to protect public health and safety, which extends to compulsory vaccination laws. Decided February 20, 1905 (argued December 6, 1904). Opinion of the Court: John Marshall Harlan → go there Dissenting: Brewer, Peckham. Topic: Public health and safety. 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. Wiki link