U.S. Drug Czar John Walters is in Tampa touting local programs aimed at stopping students from using and abusing prescription drugs...
In 1995, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that public schools could conduct random drug testing of athletes, expanding that in 2002 to include students involved in extracurricular activities.
Again with the "Czar", and I repeat my standard question:
How come they never say Führer?
I don't get how this isn't a violation of the Fourth Amendment. You can explain it 'til the cows come home, and I still won't get it.
This article doesn't make it clear if now all students, as opposed to those engaged in extracurricular activities, will be subject to random testing, and if it will include public, as well as Catholic high schools. And I don't pretend to know the circumstances of the SCOTUS case where they smothered 4A in their robes, but here's a thought, perhaps already tried and discarded, but as far as I know it's original:
If the random testing applies to all students in public schools, since attendance up to a certain age is generally compulsory,wouldn't subjecting them to an involuntary search under those conditions be a violation of the Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination...?
In any case, isn't it nice to know that government, instituted among men to secure the blessings of liberty, is teaching young people to be suspects and inmates, whose bodies are the property of the state, rather than sovereign Citizens?
While I agree with you whole-heartedly, I believe an argument can be made that schools are basically given "guardianship rights" during the day by the parent/guardian. If that is the case, then if you agree it is a parent's rights to search their child, or force them to take drug tests, then you could also argue that the school is in the right. I don't think that parents knowingly consent to handing over their child's 4th Amendment rights, but I doubt many care either.
ReplyDeleteI can see a happy medium in simply allowing parents to exempt their children from general-student-body drug testing. Of course, the exemption wouldn't apply for privileges (such as sports, etc.) that require drug-tests.
I remember the shit we went through in school, when the general consensus was that "kids don't have any rights", and it still raises my blood pressure to think about it. But I have no problem with schools doing anything with informed parental consent.
see, those pesky "civil rights" thingummys are things you only get on your 18th birthday, and some of them not even then. minor children and juveniles are property, except they're property that's technically supposed to be treated decently by adults.
ReplyDeleteI went to work when I was seven. I took care of my baby sister. I also attended school. By the time I no longer absolutely had to work, it was too late, I had become a person. I was a very good student but also considered a "problem student". There were no adult asses I would kiss.
ReplyDeleteThere were no rights I would not exercise if I so chose and there were no excuses I would make for being a person. I ran afoul of school policy, I also ran afoul of local law enforcement personnel, but not the law. I fought for me and mine. I still do. I lost some battles, but I never lost any wars, because they are not over until I say they are over and I never would so long as someone tried to step on me because I was a "kid". I haven't matured out of that mindset and hope I never do, though I sure as Hell am no kid anymore. As far as the drug fuhrer goes, fuck him, the horse he rode in on, and the no good Texas sonofabitch that sent him. And fuck all those people who won't tell him to go fuck himself.
I think I hate all the sonsofbitches that make it to DC. The liberals want to bribe and deceive you of your rights, the social conservatives are liberals who want to shoot you out of them and there are no political conservatives who want to mind their own damn businsess and let us mind ours. And none of these sonsofbitches seem to read or hold a goddamned thing dearer than themselves. They would and have sold their children, but they can't sell mine, not without consequence.
The primary issue I want to known is if it’s ok to randomly test students why not the teachers?
ReplyDeleteI'm thinking SCOTUS ruled that way because the students only receive "administrative penalties" if they're found to have illegal substances, rather than prosecuting them in juvenile court.
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