“A cow is a very good animal in the field,” said Samuel Johnson, “but we turn her out of the garden.”
Drug testing likewise is appropriate in some settings and not others. Last week, the Supreme Court accurately identified one place where it makes little sense and offends the Constitution.
In 1993, Georgia passed a law requiring all candidates for state offices to undergo a urinalysis proving that they had not recently used marijuana, cocaine or other illicit substances. One candidate nominated by the Libertarian Party, which supports legalization of such drugs, sued to scuttle the law. Two lower courts spurned that request, but by an 8-1 vote, the Supreme Court said the test amounted to an unreasonable search, infringing on the 4th Amendment.
The court has upheld drug testing of Customs Service agents involved in drug interdiction, of railway employees involved in accidents and of schoolchildren playing interscholastic sports. The state of Georgia argued that such screening was equally valid for aspiring public servants, because drug use can impair their judgment and undermine public trust.
Those are understandable concerns, said Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg in the court’s opinion, but not formidable enough to justify an invasion of privacy–particularly an ineffectual one. As the state admitted, there is no record of Georgia officials being involved in drug use. And even if there were, these tests wouldn’t catch many. As Ginsburg noted, all but the most hopelessly addicted candidates could easily abstain long enough to pass the test.
The only real value of the requirement, said the court, is that it enables the state to display its aversion to drug use. But mere symbolism doesn’t justify a serious intrusion on people who are not suspected of wrongdoing.
Drug testing is one of those tools that people are inclined to accept without thinking, as a worthy effort to combat a social scourge. But even valuable tools can be misused.
