Drug Tests Are Unconstitutional

Drug Tests Are Unconstitutional

Our government has chosen to ignore our rights as citizens. Random

drug tests on student athletes violate the right to privacy. Random

drug testing violates our personal rights in the Fourth Amendment in

the Constitution. The amendment states that U.S.citizens should be

protected against unreasonable search and seizure. This is not the

only reason random drug testing should be illegal in schools. Other

reasons include students might not join athletic teams because of the

consequences that might occur, it might encourage students to do drugs

that will not appear on the drug test, certain students might get

targeted for testing, and it will also cost the school a lot of money.

The fourth amendment states that there must be a clear reason or

individualized suspicion when a search occurs. When there are random

drug tests this is not the case. Sandra Day O'Connor supports this.

She is a U.S. Supreme Court Justice. She said that blanket searches

involve thousands or millions of searches pose a greater threat to

liberty than suspicion based ones. This is because suspicion based

ones affect one person at a time. She thinks that randomly testing

students for drugs violates there right to privacy. She says the best

way to protect a student's right to privacy is to perform drug tests

only on those who can be reasonably suspected of using drugs.

Students might not join an athletic team because they do not want to

be drug tested. If a student tests positive, the teachers might look

down on them. They could single them out for a bad grade. Random drug

testing damages relationships. It could be parent-child or

teacher-student. Drug testing young people when they are not actually

suspected of using drugs sends the message to them that they are not

to be trusted. Many students find that drug testing is very

intolerable and intrusive on there privacy. The millions of students