I don't recall any governor who ran on a platform of, "here are all the possible scenarios that could impact anyone in my state and how I would approach them."

You vote for a governor because you believe they will make a decision you generally agree with when presented with facts. Your vote says that for the next little while you think this person would represent your interests, no matter what happens. Some governors have mild terms, others have catastrophes they have to navigate.

No governor lists all the powers granted by previous legislatures as things they are running on. If you don't like them having such powers, elect people to remove such powers.

That you don't like it does not mean the majority of civil society doesn't like it, and the price you pay to have civil society is having laws not every single person likes at all times. But the mechanism is there to pursue change.

If the voters had known that their governor would exercise virtually unlimited powers based on what amounts to a little known emergency powers dictatorship clause - would they have voted for him? If not, do these governors really have the consent of the governed to do these things willy nilly of the legislature's blessing?

List the state where you think governors used powers not granted to them by the legislature.

If you, as a citizen, are unaware of public laws passed by your legislature, then you cannot blame the governor for using them during an emergency. It's your fault for not knowing the law, which in probably every case, has been public knowledge for decades.

I know in the states near me, MI, IN, OH, all the states have various powers granted to the governors, and I have known about them and the powers granted for two of the states for over a decade.

When you get surprised by things you didn't know but could have easily known beforehand, don't get so upset that someone is tricking you. They are not.

>If you, as a citizen, are unaware of public laws passed by your legislature, then you cannot blame the governor for using them during an emergency. It's your fault for not knowing the law, which in probably every case, has been public knowledge for decades.

The publicity of a law among tens of thousands of other laws is irrelevant. Government authority comes from the consent of the governed. Citizens do not give consent to something just because its on the books. People have jobs and real things to get done in their lives. They cannot and should not be expected to waste their time crawling through hundreds of thousands of pages of legislation, let alone have the legal background to interpret all of it. Imagine how much of an asshole you sound like right now: "Oh, your family business went bankrupt because of lockdowns? You have no right to complain, you should have studied § 46.2-872. Didn't know about it? Too bad!"

Public polling and widespread non-compliance suggests that governors lack the lockdown orders lack the consent of the governed.

>List the state where you think governors used powers not granted to them by the legislature.