With the German press and political classes hailing the ‘brave’ protests in China against the country’s zero Covid stance, one could almost forget that many of these people were competing for the crown of toughest lockdown advocate less than a year ago.

Particularly culpable was Bavaria’s conservative leader Marcus Söder, who became an unlikely hero to the left over his proclivity for shutting people in their homes.

Last week, the Federal Administrative Court found that Söder had breached the constitution in doing so. A rule set in Bavaria early in the pandemic that issued a round-the-clock ban on leaving the house without good reason was “disproportionate” and “a serious curtailment of constitutional rights,” the court found.

Under the rules imposed in Bavaria for most of April 2020, people were not allowed to sit on a park bench or meet anyone from outside their own household. The court specifically criticized the ban on “lingering” outside, saying that there was no epidemiological jus…