The Battalion
Tim
OPINION
Monday, March 27,1989
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Drug testing violates rights
Do you think you should have to sub
mit to regular drug tests administered
by your employer?
Scot Walker
A majority of the members of The
Battalion Editorial Board think so.
An editorial on this page Friday com
mended two recent Supreme Court rul
ings that approved mandatory drug
tests for government workers in sensi
tive positions and whose jobs involve
public safety.
Wire Editor
and
Drew Leder
News Editor
the results of that test became available
years later -when you applied for a job
with IBM?
These rulings make sense. The Su
preme Court should be commended for
putting public safety above all else in
making its decisions.
However, the editorial also praised
these rulings because they will encour
age private companies to test their em
ployees for drug use.
This is where it went too far.
Drug testing of people whose jobs
have a direct impact on the safety of
others is acceptable because it could
have serious ramifications on people’s
lives. But for every person in this nation
to be subjected to such an infringement
of individual liberties is abhorrent.
Drug-testing proponents reason that
an employer has a right to expect a cer
tain level of performance from an em
ployee. If the employee is taking drugs,
they say, the employer has a right to
know because the drugs might have an
adverse effect on the employee’s pro
ductivity.
While it probably is true that drugs
would hamper an employee’s productiv
ity, this does not give an employer the
right to invade his workers’ private lives.
When a person hires on to do a job, he
enters into an agreement to perform
specified duties at an acceptable level
for a specified rate of compensation. He
is not presenting his life, with all of his
secrets and personal decisions, to the
employer for examination and appro
val. If a person is performing ineffi
ciently, he should be fired. It makes no
difference whether the inefficiency is
due to drug use or laziness. The litmus
test should be job performance, and
nothing else.
Another argument for drug testing is
that drugs have become such a problem
in the United States it is necessary to in
trude on civil liberties to correct the
problem. ■*..—
Sorry, but that dog won’t hunt.
Granted, the drug problem in this
country requires some combative mea
sures. A so-called “war on drugs” is un
derway, and in times of war, individual
freedoms sometimes must be re
strained. But is America really at war
with an inanimate object? The real war
is to save ourselves from self-destruc
tion. By restraining our individual liber
ties to fight a war with ourselves, any
way you look at it we lose. There is no
end result that justifies taking away the
liberties and freedoms upon which this
country was founded.
Drug testing logic could be applied in
a incredible array of situations, leading
to a frightening vision of America’s fu
ture. For instance, according to an arti
cle in the March 20 edition of Time
magazine, scientists in the very near fu
ture will be able to screen a person’s
DNA to determine diseases a person is
likely to develop, what a person will die
of, and even when he will die. An em
ployer could conceivably try to guar
antee a healthy and thus more produc
tive workforce by making job applicants
submit to genetic screening.
Would you, as an employer, hire
someone whose genetic tests revealed a
Huntington’s marker near the end of
The logic that drug-testing propo
nents use also could be applied to an un
limited number of other activities. Auto
mobile accidents and smoking, for
example, are among the greatest killers
of our time. Could an employer prohibit
smoking and driving to protect his in
terest in having employess who are less
likely to die or be injured, thus reducing
the company’s productivity?
Drug-testing proponents respond
that an important distinction is that
most drugs are illegal, while smoking
cigarettes, driving a car or having Hunt
ington’s disease are not.
So what?
The police have the responsibility to
find people who break the law. All your
employer should worry about is
whether you come to work on time and
do your job efficiently. This business of
delving into people’s personal lives to
dig up all of their secrets is getting car
ried away, and if it goes too far, we are
going to pay the price with the contin
ued loss of our personal freedoms.
The most often heard line by those
who favor drug testing is, “If you don’t
take drugs, you have nothing to worry
about.” We disagree. To us, giving up
individual rights and dignities is a lot to
worry about.
Scot Walker is a junior journalism
major and Drew Leder is a senior ac
counting major. Both are members of
The Battalion Editorial Board.
Some would say it is the employer’s
choice to set policy for his company as
he sees fit. But that line of thinking has
been shot down by child-labor laws, la
bor unions and the minimum-wage law.
chromosome four? Of course you ■
wouldn’t, because Huntington’s disease BLOOM COUNTY
is a painful, debilitating and invariably
fatal disorder that strikes adults be
tween the ages of 35 and 45, when they
would otherwise be in the prime of their
productivity.
What if the results of genetic and
drug tests were put into a computer
bank? We could all have a health and
morals rating similar to our credit rat
ing, accessible by anyone with a phone
and a personal computer. What if you
failed a drug test when you were 18, try
ing to get a job at Burger King, and then
Me
Mail Call
Signs leave good impression
EDITOR:
I want to thank Texas A&M University for placing those new signs on every
building. But wouldn’t we be embarrassed it someone pointed out that “Hughes
Hall” is now “Huges Hall”? How about the English Annex being the sight for
communications (except its sign is missing an “m”)?
1 cringe when I think of what people experience when they visit our
“institution of higher learning.”
Lisa Newton ’91
Letters to the editor should ?iot exceed 300 words in length. The editorial staff reserves the right to edit letters/onMl
and length, but will make every effort to maintain the author's intent. Each letter must be signed and must mcWiiiJ
classification, address and telephone number of the writer.
What will become
of Randall Adams?l
Imagine that you’re walking down
University Drive tomorrow afternoon.
A police officer approaches you, shows
you a warrant for your arrest and takes
you to jail. You’ve been charged with
homicide.
Eventually you receive a trial, and
you are convicted of murder. The sen
tence is life in prison. You file all sorts
of appeals, but you still end up in jail.
Twelve years later (March 2001) it is
proved that you did not commit the
murder of which you were convicted.
You’re released from prison, and you
rush home to a long-awaited reunion
with your family and friends.
After carefully considering the situa
tion, you decide you should be fully
compensated for the time you spent in
prison.
But there’s just one problem.
Because of a U.S. Supreme Court rul
ing and a Texas state law, you cannot
sue any witnesses, jurors, prosecutors or
judges who were involved in your case.
What can you do about this unjust sit
uation?
Not much.
And that’s exactly what Randall Ad
ams can do about the time he spent in
prison — not much.
Even though Adams served a 12-year
sentence for a crime he didn’t commit, it
appears the only compensation he will
receive is his freedom.
If he’s lucky, maybe he’ll get a few
bucks. But the chances of Adams receiv
ing adequate restitution appear slim in
deed.
o Adams can’t sue his prosecutors be
cause of a state law which grants pros
ecutors immunity from certain lawsuits.
“Even if there’s out and out miscon
duct . . . even if he (the prosecutor) lied
. . . you can’t sue the prosecutor,” Doug
Larson, a Dallas civil rights attorney,
told the Associated Press.
That’s just not fair.
If a prosecutor lies or performs un
ethically during a trial and the result is
that an innocent person goes to jail, that
person should be able to sue the pros
ecutor.
The intent of this state law is to pro
tect prosecutors who are performing
their official duties. If prosecutors had
to worry about getting sued over every
case they took, few people would want
to become prosecutors. But would it be
that terrible if lawsuits were allowed in
cases where it was proved the prosecu
tor lied or intentionally hid facts?
Dean
Sueltenfuss
Opinion Page Editor
No, of course not.
Honest prosecutors would have noil I
ing to worry about, because they coulil
not be sued unless they intentionally del
ceived the court. Even the most inepil
prosecutors would be safe as longaithi
mistakes they made were honest ones.
The same reasoning applies to wit{
nesses, jurors and judges. If any oil
these people lie or knowingly disregard!
facts and an innocent person is sentiol
jail, these people should be open tolad
suits.
What makes Adams’ situation i
intolerable is that so many frivolousla»|
suits are allowed to take place in Amer
ica. If someone runs over your
you’re free to sue them for the erao-|
tional distress you suffered as a resultoil
your dog’s death. If your child jumps!
off the balcony after watching a WyleEl
Coyote cartoon, you’re free to
Warner Bros, for $ 15 million.
But if you are forced to sit in jail foil
12 years for a crime you didn’t comnit
can you sue anybody?
No.
It’s unfortunate that a lawsuit is necl
essary in cases such as Adams’. Thestattj
should have a provision under whichi
nocent people who are imprisoned an I
tomatically receive restitution.
The Texas Legislature and/or tkel
U.S. Congress should consider passingJi
law that automatically and fairly coral
pensates people such as Randall Adamsl
for the suffering the government hail
put them through. It simply isn’t rig
that people can be imprisoned foil
crimes they didn’t commit, and wli
the mistake is discovered, all the gi
eminent does is say: “Oops, sorry atx
that. But it’s OK. We’ll let you o
There —you’re free.”
There is no way we can give the 1
12 years of Randall Adams’ life back to I
him.
The least we can do is to maketM
rest of his life as comfortable as possible
Dean Sueltenfuss is a junior journi' [
lism major and opinion page editor foil
The Battalion.
by Berke Breathed
The Battalion
(USPS 045 360)
Member of
Texas Press Association
Southwest Journalism Conference
The Battalion Editorial Board
Becky Weisenfels, Editor
Leslie Guy, Managing Editor
Dean Sueltenfuss, Opinion Page Editor
Anthony Wilson, City Editor
Scot Walker, Wire Editor
Drew Leder, News Editor
Doug Walker, Sports Editor
Jay Janner, Art Director
Mary-Lynne Rice, Entertainment Edi
tor
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