SF395, the Uniform Recognition and Enforcement of Canadian Orders for Protection Act, allows Minnesota law enforcement agencies to enforce orders for protection issued in Canada without a requirement that such orders be filed with a court in the United States.
The Senate passed SF395 on March 8, 2021, by a vote of 66 to 0. We have assigned minuses to the yeas because all law enforcement and judicial officers in each state are bound by oath to support the U.S. Constitution, which provides a 5th Amendment guarantee that “no person” shall be deprived of liberty “without due process of law” and a 14th Amendment prohibition that “no state shall make or enforce any law” abridging the “privileges or immunities” of American citizens. Article IV, Section 1, of the U.S. Constitution confers recognition to only the “public Acts, Records, and judicial Proceedings of every other State,” not judgements of foreign nations. Protective orders must satisfy the requirement that U.S. courts apply the “supreme law of the land” to be domestically valid or enforceable.