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Sitaram · Site Admin Joined: 14 Sep 2005 Posts: 1079

Date: Wed Jul 2, 2003 12:25 am
Subject: Mandatory Drug Tests & Civil Liberty om_namah_shi...

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Mandatory Drug Tests & Civil Liberty

Larry v. Lockney

Is mandatory drug testing in high schools a violation of students'
rights? Hear what teens, parents and teachers have to say.

http://www.pbs.org/pov/pov2003/larryvlockney/

Is drug testing in public schools an invasion of privacy or a useful
tool for dealing with substance abuse?

'Larry v. Lockney' is about one particular clash in one particular
place over the nation's War on Drugs. But it's also just another
chapter in the age-old debate over majority rule versus minority
rights. It's a story as American as apple pie..."

=============================================

Sitaram would like to make some comments about this excellent
documentary which aired on Public Television.

First and foremost, I see Larry Tannahill and his family as not only
a great heroes, but possibly the only real Christians to appear in
the documentary.

The crowds of people that I saw in the Lockney school meetings
impressed me as being just like the pharisaical hypocrites, praying
on the street corner, whom Jesus condemned. Jesus clearly states in
the Gospels that he who prays conspicuously in public, with great
show and flourish, already has their reward as the wages of spiritual
vanity, while the genuine Christian prays privately and secretly in
the privacy of their home. The Lockney school board delighted in
standing before the television cameras, bowing their heads and
praying to their Texan Protestant version of Jesus.

The people in the community of Lockney are glaring examples of the
failure of Christianity and the failure of Jesus. If they were truly
the exemplary Christians and good Americans that they pompously
believe themselves to be, then they would have raised their children
to be the kind of people who do not need to anesthetize themselves
with drugs and alcohol in their geometry class. I am not saying that
I personally believe that the people of Lockney could have or should
have been successful with such upbringing, but am simply pointing out
that Protestant Christians paint a picture of their religion as
something necessary and sufficient to transform individuals' lives,
which is obviously not the case from this documentary film. If
Christianity and Jesus and "being saved" were all that
Texas "Christians" claim it to be, then the children and parents
would truly be saved from intoxication, saved from persecuting one
lone family, the Tannahills, saved from firing Larry Tannahill from a
job simply because he had the courage to make a lone stand against
mobocracy and majority tyranny, and saved from the contemptible and
cowardly act of shooting the Tannahill family dog with a paint-gun,
hinting that more lethal violence would follow. But no, their brand
of "christianity" and "born-again" and "being saved" doesn't work. It
doesn't do a damn bit of good. So they must resort to brute force
methods like random drug testing. They go though the motion of
securing parental consent, but when one parent does not care to
consent, then they take of their goody two-shoes Christian masks and
show their true K.K.K. mentality. Oh, and by the way, I didn't see
many non-white faces in the faculty or student body (but I guess that
is not surprising).

No, the people of Lockney are not saved from anything. Nor do the
parents and children of families have the courage or honesty to speak
candidly with each other about their problems. No, the only solution
they can find is to constantly tyrannize the students with random
drug tests and humiliate them by forcing them to urinate in cups.

Larry Tannahill never asked the school to stop their drug testing. He
simply requested the right to excuse his own children from a practice
and a principle of which he disapproved. Larry, no scholar or
orator, but a hard-working farmer, and a man of courageous integrity,
stated his objection simply and eloquently: "If I were to give
parental consent for my children to be tested in this fashion, I
would be telling them I do not trust them." But the people of
Lockney could not find enough Christian charity (and Christian
humility) in their hearts to respect the wishes and beliefs of one
sincere family. One would think that IMPLICIT in the notion of
seeking parental consent for the testing is an acknowledgment of the
possibility that some parents MAY CHOOSE NOT to consent, and that
provisions would be made to honor and respect the wishes of those who
choose dissent.

Larry's attorney, in his opening statements to the school board,
tried to put them all at ease by saying that he was not "some Yankee
from the East with a ponytail, come to tell them how to live their
lives". Does my memory fail me, or is it not true that most of the
Baptist paintings of Jesus show him with a ponytail (or at least hair
long enough to be in a ponytail). And come to think of it, Jesus was
from the East as well (the middle-east, anyway). I could not help
wondering what is so wrong with someone from the East, or a man with
long hair (or a bald man, or a bald woman for that matter). Larry's
attorney assured the board that he was one of them, from WESTERN
Texas (gosh, I guess anything slightly east is bad, even east Texas;
perhaps lawyers in east Texas have longer hair).

One newscaster summed up the problem with the people of Lockney in
one simple observation: "They treated the school board meeting like a
highschool athletic pep rally. They were right, and the only ones
right. They were the majority and majority rules. Might makes Right."

"Yeah Jesus! Rah Rah Rah!" Perhaps all of Christianity could be
summed up as a pep-rally for a Jesus, a false Jesus, while along the
real Jesus would find them all to be a contemptible abomination.

I suppose the people of Lockney will feel quite indignant over my
categorical condemnation of them. I supposed they would even
consider shooting MY dog with a paint-gun (or a shotgun) but for the
fact that my dog died years ago and I shall never have another.

Texas has the greatest number of small Christian radio stations
preaching 24/7 and the nation's record for executions on death row.
What is the answer, preach harder, or execute more frequently? I
don't pretend to know the answer to that one. I simply know failure
when I see it.

(end of Sitaram's comments)

========================

Many Americans, maybe even most, have come to believe that our form
of democracy can be summarized in just two words: "majority rules."
If you've got the votes, you win.

However, it's never been that simple. The original framers of the
Constitution were concerned about the likelihood that majorities
would overwhelm the inalienable rights of sizable minorities or even
stubborn individuals who disagreed. And so, for instance, they
designed a system that makes it possible for a presidential candidate
to win more votes nationwide than any other but still lose to the
runner-up because of the influence of small states in the Electoral
College.

They also wrote a Bill of Rights that was amended to the Constitution
to specifically protect the rights of political minorities against
the onslaught of any majority, no matter how well meaning.

Because, despite the righteousness of the cause or the decency of the
people, majorities can sometimes infringe upon what others believe to
be their constitutionally guaranteed rights. Then it's up to the
courts to referee the competing claims of whose liberty is better
protected by the law of the land.

Can the federal government force you to incriminate yourself or
others in the name of national security? Can a state law force you to
register your handgun? Can a public school randomly drug test
students it does not suspect of using drugs? The answers the courts
give are, in turn, dependent on the times, the political context, and
yes, even the will of a majority — ultimately at least five out of
the nine presidentially-appointed Justices of the Supreme Court.

"Larry v. Lockney" is about one particular clash in one particular
place over the nation's War on Drugs. But it's also just another
chapter in the age-old debate over majority rule versus minority
rights. It's a story as American as apple pie. The additional clash
between issues of public safety versus individual freedom makes the
film that much more timely in a post 9/11 world.

http://www.pbs.org/pov/pov2003/larryvlockney/about.html

Meet Larry Tannahill. Out of 2,200 residents in the West Texas town
of Lockney, he was the only parent to object to the school board's
mandatory drug-testing policy in 2000. Tannahill, a third-generation
cotton farmer, believed the testing was a violation of his 12-year-
old son's Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable search and
seizure. Forming an unlikely alliance with the American Civil
Liberties Union, he sued to overturn the policy, and found his life
forever changed.

In the battle that ensued, Tannahill made headlines as his case went
to the U.S. District Court. Although he won the lawsuit, his victory
came at great personal cost: he lost his job and his home, and became
a target of threats. "Larry v. Lockney" takes a personal look at all
sides in this landmark case that pitted one man against his friends
and neighbors.

In February 2000 the Lockney Independent School District, near
Lubbock, Texas, instituted a mandatory drug-testing policy for junior
and senior high school students; it was reported to be the most
sweeping drug-testing program in the country. When Tannahill refused
to sign the consent form for his son Brady to participate, the school
district planned to punish Brady with an in-school suspension, drug
counseling and removal from extracurricular activities: the same
penalty for those who flunked the test.

In March 2000, Tannahill filed suit with the help of the ACLU. The
district's school board then dropped the in-school suspension and
drug counseling requirements, but Tannahill and the ACLU continued
the suit in Federal District Court, attracting intense and unwanted
media attention to the small town of Lockney. Tannahill found himself
ostracized in the community, where parents, teachers and students
alike were overwhelmingly in favor of the new policy.

In March 2001, U.S. District Judge Sam Cummings ruled that Lockney's
drug-testing policy was unconstitutional. The following month, the
Lockney Independent School District dropped plans to appeal the
decision. The school district settled with the ACLU and agreed to pay
some of Tannahill's attorneys' fees and return to its policy of
testing only students who volunteer or who appear to be under the
influence of drugs.

While understanding the fine balance between protecting individual
liberties and maintaining public security, many see a difficult road
ahead. "It's going to be a lot harder for parents to sign their kids
up for voluntary drug testing than it would be for parents to
say, 'You've got to; the school says so'," remarks Alice Gilroy,
editor of the Floyd County Hesperian-Beacon and a parent herself.

If a court can settle the legal wrangling, it can't rule away the
toll that this case took on Larry Tannahill and his family. He notes
without bitterness, "It's worth your job. It's worth some ridicule
from your community if you believe in what you're fighting for."

SFG75 · Posted: Wed Oct 05, 2005 7:42 pm Post subject:

To me, this is an egregious assault upon the constitution. For one, reasonable suspicion does NOT mean: "Let's assume everyone is guilty." When you have this blanket searching or peeking around for what kids MIGHT have done, you are standing the 4th amendment of the constitution on its head. Even if some members of the student population use drugs, you cannot violate individual rights simply because you assign collective guilt to every individual in the entire student body. The family is more than in the right when it comes to defending the constitution and their civil liberties. It's sad and disappointing that others have acquiesced so easily. :roll:

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