"We find that testing students who participate in extracurricular activities is a reasonably effective means of addressing the school district's legitimate concerns in preventing, deterring and detecting drug use," Justice Clarence Thomas wrote for himself, Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist and Justices Antonin Scalia, Anthony M. Kennedy and Stephen Breyer.
The court stopped short of allowing random tests for any student, whether or not involved in extracurricular activities, but several justices have indicated they are interested in answering that question at some point.
The court ruled against a former Oklahoma high school honor student who competed on an academic quiz team and sang in the choir. Lindsay Earls, a self-described "goodie two-shoes," tested negative but sued over what she called a humiliating and accusatory policy.
The Pottawatomie County school system had considered testing all students. Instead, it settled for testing only those involved in extracurricular activities on the theory that by voluntarily representing the school, those students had a lower expectation of privacy than did students at large.
Breyer agreed w/ the majority. That's surprising. It just goes to show you can never be so sure who is going to be on your side and who isn't.
Later, Justice Thomas was heard mumbling, "But I am glad schools were not allowed to do this when I was a kid".
(06-27) 07:16 PDT (AP) --
Of the estimated 14 million American high school students, better than 50 percent probably participate in some form of organized after-school activity, educators say. The trend is toward ever greater extracurricular participation, largely because colleges consider it a factor in admissions.
Earls and the American Civil Liberties Union argued that the Oklahoma school board could not show that drugs were a big problem at Tecumseh High School. She claimed the "suspicionless" drug tests violated the Constitution's guarantee against unreasonable searches.
Pottawatomie educators, backed by the Bush administration, argued that any drug problem is a concern. Also, the school said, the drug tests were a deterrent for students who knew they could not participate in favorite activities unless they stayed clean.
During oral arguments in the case in March, a Bush administration lawyer said universal testing would be constitutional, even though a lawyer for the Oklahoma school said she doubted that would be so.
Numerous schools installed drug testing programs for athletes after the 1995 ruling, but wider drug testing remains relatively rare among the nation's 15,500 public school districts. Lower courts have reached differing conclusions about the practice.
The Tecumseh testing program ran for part of two school years, beginning in 1998. It was suspended after Earls and another student sued. Earls is now a student at Dartmouth College.
The Tecumseh policy covered a range of voluntary clubs and sports, including the Future Farmers of America club, cheerleading and football. Students were tested at the beginning of the school year. Thereafter, tests were random.
Overall, 505 high school students were tested for drug use. Three students, all of them athletes, tested positive.
A federal appeals court ruled against the program, saying it took the Supreme Court's 1995 ruling too far. Sports are different from other extracurricular activities, the lower court said, and the school had not done enough to show that students who participated in those activities were abusing drugs.
The school district appealed to the Supreme Court.
The case is Board of Education of Independent School District No. 92 of Pottawatomie County v. Earls, 01-332.
Earth to Clarence Thomas and the other assorted dunderheads.
Students on the Chess Club and the Debating team are not the ones doing drugs.
Forcing drug free students to pee in a cup to satisfy some anal retentive administrator is not only an totally unjustified unacceptable infringement of individual rights but is borderline perverted.
The Principal and his cronies should get their kicks somewhere else.
Just goes to show that no court is right 100% of the time.