Parental Consent Drug Testing And Counseling Act example essay topic

Drug Testing Making a person take a drug test violates their Fourth and Fifth Amendment rights under the constitution of the United States of America. Recently, there has been an increase in companies and schools using drug test. Some companies force their employees to submit to a drug test before being hired and randomly while employed. High school sport regulations require that all student athletes give consent to being randomly drug tested. Other schools are going as far as making all students give consent to being randomly drug tested.

The Fourth Amendment states, "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated". By taking a drug test, a person is being searched and having a sample to be tested seized without probable cause, therefore, companies and schools using a drug test are infringing on the student or employees rights. In South Carolina, a hospital was drug testing pregnant women and reporting the positive results to the police. The Supreme Court found this to be a violation of the Forth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution's protection against unreasonable search and seizures without probable cause.

There is a very large possibility for an error on a drug test. If a person applying for a job takes a drug test and gets a false positive, this would cause him to not be hired. Also, if a company randomly tests an employee and he receives a false positive, he would lose his job. Some people are fighting back when they wrongfully lose a job, but most people will not know why they did not get the job. A flight attendant from Delta Airlines lost her job because she failed a drug test. She was accused of tampering with her urine sample.

The flight attendant, Yasuko Ishikawa, Had another test done that came out negative for drugs, and it showed she had not tampered with the sample. She was awarded $400,000 because the lab that tested her was found to be negligent. Since there is a chance of error this should not be allowed. If one person loses a job because of an error, it is not fair. So until there is a test that is extremely accurate every time, no one should be screened for drugs. A school in Beaumont, Texas wanted to force all there students to submit to random drug test.

The school forces every student from sixth to twelfth grade that drives to school or plays sports affiliated with the school agree to take a drug test if they are one of the ten that are randomly picked each month. This policy was adopted in April. Since it was adopted, about half of the three hundred and seventy-five students have returned the forms. "I don't have a problem with drug testing", James Hughes said.

"I have a problem with stomping on the Constitution". Mr. Hughes is a school board member and one of the many parents that refuse to sign the forms. There was a bill that was brought up during the 106th Congress of the United States for the first Session. This bill was to give money to states and local agencies to require random drug testing and counseling for students in grade ninth through twelfth. This act would be called the "Parental Consent Drug Testing and Counseling Act". The requirements would be that the agency must develop a plan to implement a drug testing and counseling program.

The funds that are received due to this bill would be used for giving random drug testing for all students in ninth through twelfth grade and counseling for any student that fails a test. The parents must give permission for their child to be tested. Parents are notified when a student fails a test or refuses to take a test. Once a student fails a test, he is tested again in four to six weeks.

If a student fails a second test, he will be forced to take drug test every four to six weeks and put in to counseling until his parents remove him from the program. No one gets access to these results besides the student, his parents, and the agency that is counseling him. Law enforcement does not get access to the records and there should be some way set up by the state to enforce that the test are private. This bill is a complete violation of these students' fourth amendment rights.

They are forced to take drug test without probable cause. Drug testing should not be allowed for many reasons. One major reason why drug testing should not be allowed is that they are not very accurate. Since you cannot trust these tests, they should be thrown out. A person cannot be cut from a job because they failed a drug test.

When it could have been that this person took an Advil before the test, which would cause a false positive for marijuana. The second major reason is that drug testing is unconstitutional. By forcing someone to take a drug test, their Fourth Amendment rights to protection from search and seizure without probable cause are violated.

Bibliography

Botched Drug Test Brings Award". New York Times, 7 July 2001, sec.
A, p. 10". Court Ruling Protects Patients and Privacy". Buffalo News, 2 April 2001, sec.
Local, p. B 4". School's drug-test policy draws fire from parents". Houston Chronicle, 7 September 2001, sec.