Florida, Kentucky and Drug Testing

Conservatives have gone viral recently in places like Facebook with this simplistic little diddy on drug testing welfare reciepients:

THANK YOU FLORIDA AND KENTUCKY!!!! Florida and Kentucky the first states that will require drug testing when applying for welfare, effective July 1st! Some people are crying this is unconstitutional. How is this unconstitutional? It's OK to drug test the people who work for their money but not those who don't? Re-post if you want all states to do this.

I love their rhetorical question: How can this be unconstitution? The question is followed by a piece of misinformation: It's OK to drug test the people who work...

The truth is it's not always "OK" (I think that's code for "constitutional") to test people who work. In the private sector it's a contractional agreement that you enter into before you take a job. You enter into it voluntarily (since you could choose to go work omewhere else, instead). If you work for the government, the courts have ruled that you can be required to take drug tests if your job performance could endanger public safety. Washington can drug test air traffic controllers, but not clerical staff.

Many of the viral status updates that Conservatives circulate make perfect sense - as long as you believe the little untruth planted at the heart of them (in this case,"It's OK to drug test the people who work..."). And if you're well informed on the issue, that little piece of untruth is usually easy to spot.

The "drug test for welfare" issue has been around for a long time now. I wrote this about it over three years ago here.

Drug Testing for Welfare Recipients?

A friend and colleague of mine sent me this email. I thought I'd post it here, along with my response to her...

THE JOB - URINE TEST

(I sure would like to know who wrote this one! They deserve a HUGE pat on the back!)

Like a lot of folks in this state, I have a job. I work, they pay me.

I pay my taxes and the government distributes my taxes as it sees fit.

In order to get that paycheck, I am required to pass a random urine test with which I have no problem.

What I do have a problem with is the distribution of my taxes to people who don't have to pass a urine test. Shouldn't one have to pass a urine test to get a welfare check because I have to pass one to earn it for them?

Please understand, I have no problem with helping people get back on their feet.

I do, on the other hand, have a problem with helping someone sitting on their rearends, doing drugs, while I work. . . . Can you imagine how much money the state would save if people had to pass a urine test to get a public assistance check?

Pass this along if you agree or simply delete if you don't. Hope you all will pass it along, though . ....Something has to change in this country -- and soon!

I replied back to her as follows:

A couple of thoughts.

1. I don't remember the last time I peed in a cup. But it was at a doctor's office. And the results were a private matter between my doctor and I, under HIPPA. Something, I suspect, to do with sugar or kidney function. But, like I said, I don't remember. I've NEVER had to provide a urine sample for some reason related to work, anywhere.

2. Drug testing is usually a safety issue, or an issue related to profitability in the contexts of a free (voluntary) association between an employer and an employee. There are jobs where the risks involved to public safety are deemed to be large enough to justify invading someone's privacy with a drug test. Major transportation jobs, like air traffic control or work as a pilot, are good examples. For profit companies that feel that drug use among employees may reduce profits sometimes advertise a drug free policy that requires drug testing; employees freely enter into that relationship and agree to abide by the drug testing as a contractual aspect of their employment. In some industries, like mining, the two reasons for drug testing overlap.

3. Food stamps, AFDC, Free Lunch at school (which I'd assume qualifies conceptually as a welfare program), disability payments, Medicaid (a need-based subsidy), the Pell Grant - none of these place the recipient of the funding in either of the above two categories. There is no justification for weakening the Fourth Amendment protection against unreasonable search - except bigotry against the poor. With an air traffic controller or a police officer who carries a gun, the courts have ruled I think that a personal search (by means of a urine test) is REASONABLE, given the risks and responsibilities of the job.

4. If drug use is a moral/legal issue that doesn't seem to be being adequately addressed where you live, there are laws and there are law enforcement agencies that the issue can be pointed out to.

5. The idea that we might cut off food stamps and Free Lunch to some of the kids on my monthly report (picture the two freckle-faced boys, or the redheaded girl in the fourth grade with two siblings in lower grades) because mom pops positive for THC on a urine test at DHHR strikes me as, well, almost fascist. Of course, we could just take her kids, but that would mean finding more foster parents and creating a bigger government to cope with all the new drug orphans.

How about if we just let police and judges do their jobs in the community, and stick with the protections offered by the Fourth Amendment...?

My thoughts,

Greg

Don't get me wrong. Drugs are a horrible plague on society. Call me a liberal, but I just don't think the solution is bringing an end to the right to avoid self-incrimination, repealing privacy laws, or punishing children for what their parents do.