Posted on 10/31/2002 4:57:12 AM PST by Wolfie
Dole Links License To Drug Test
Elizabeth Dole wants to require all teenagers to pass a drug test before getting a driver's license. Dole, the Republican U.S. Senate candidate and a former transportation secretary, has promised to push for a federal law pressuring states to enforce such a measure. "Wouldn't that help them understand how important it is to be drug free?" Dole asked at a recent campaign stop in Washington, N.C. "It's not cool (to abuse drugs). It kills."
Then-President Bill Clinton proposed a nearly identical measure in 1996 while campaigning against Dole's husband, former Sen. Bob Dole, and offered federal grants to states the following year. Campaign officials for Elizabeth Dole said they were unaware of the Clinton initiative.
Dole included the pre-license drug test as part of her "Dole Plan for North Carolina" this year, proposing that teens who test positive must complete a drug counseling course and pass a subsequent test before getting a license.
The test could be bypassed. Parents who don't want their children to take a drug test could just say no and waive the requirement, said Mary Brown Brewer, Dole's communications director.
"You can't solely address illegal drugs from the supply side. You have to address it from the demand side," Brewer said. "When you turn 16, you look so forward to getting that driver's license ... This is a pretty strong incentive not to do anything that would prevent you from getting that driver's license."
Dole has made "less government" a campaign mantra, as have many Republicans, which makes it striking that she would embrace an invasive expansion of government duties and authority. Last year, nearly 62,000 N.C. teens got their first driver's license.
A spokesman for the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said he was unaware of any states enacting such a program after the Clinton push.
Dole's opponent, Democrat Erskine Bowles, said he would like to talk with law enforcement officials, parents and teenagers before proposing such a measure.
The testing presents practical obstacles and legal questions. State motor vehicles administrations would suddenly face the costs of processing drug tests through a laboratory, not to mention the idea of testing youngsters who haven't been accused of anything. U.S. courts, though, have repeatedly upheld the constitutionality of drug tests.
Several states have zero tolerance laws on alcohol use, requiring that teens lose their license if caught driving with any of alcohol in their blood. The alcohol tests, though, are administered after a youth has been stopped on suspicion of drinking.
Substance-abuse experts said drug testing works as an incentive to keep youths from abusing drugs but likely only until they pass that checkpoint.
"Drug testing has always been a false promise that it would help us somehow by threatening people and make them stop so they wouldn't get into trouble," said John P. Morgan, a physician and City University of New York medical professor who has studied drug testing for 15 years.
He said the vast majority of positive drug tests detect nothing stronger than marijuana, and occasional smokers need only stop for a couple of weeks to pass.
Carl Shantzis, executive director of Substance Abuse Prevention Services in Charlotte, said prevention policy requires follow-up.
"Once teenagers get a license," Shantzis said, "the question is what kind of other incentives are there to keep them from abusing alcohol or other drugs."
Actually, it's usually three year olds who resort to the likes of the above in debate. See ya, dcwusmc.
I value my family's safety on the road more than the 'right' of a teen to do drugs and drive. I'm a really, really DANGEROUS man!!!
The majority can only make rules that do not infringe upon the rights of the minority. Suppose the majority decided to tax yendu bwam at a 95% rate. Since the majority wants it, there's no better alternative, right?
Surely you understand that everyone retains certain rights, regardless of what the majority wants.
You know, I have come to believe that the reason why so many people who call themselves "conservatives" refuse to understand this principle is that they know that most laws infringe on the rights of others, and if they were to accept this principle, then there would not be much of a wide scope of which laws could be made. They opperate under the faulty assumption that we as a people continuously need more laws. The words of yendu bwam echoe this throughout his/her posts - that we can not survive unless we continuously create more laws.
Surely you understand that everyone retains certain rights, regardless of what the majority wants.
Here is where YB states that the rights retained are only the ones specifically mentioned in th Constitution. Because, if the governemnt could only do what the Constitution allows it, well, there would be hardly a reason for elections, because politicians couldn't have control over you, and it wouldn't matter which party won. Can't have that, now can we.
The fact is, NittanyLion, that if the majority of voters want tax at a 95% rate (and of course, they do not), they could vote in representatives who would pass a law to do that - and there is nothing unconsitutional about that. That's how our system works. In our system, majorities can pass anything that's not unconstitutional. I NEVER said that if a majority wants something, there's no better alternative. Just that in our democracy, majority rules (as in any democracy) - subject to consitutional limitations.
Well, they didn't do so - because Senators weren't directly elected, and they instituted the electoral college (which didn't have to vote according to the electorate) and because blacks and women couldn't vote. Today, we elect senators directly, blacks and women can vote - we still have an electoral college, and in that sense we do not have a perfect democracy. But the fact is, philman_36, however much you want to scream on these posts, we vote, directly or indirectly, for all political offices in this country, and our leadership clearly reflects the will of the people. Normal people anywhere in the world would call (and they certainly do call) this a democracy. (Yes, it's also a republic.) We are one of the most democratic nations in the world - and most people know that.
An apple is an apple and an orange is an orange. You prefer fruit.
Would love to chat, philman_36, but have to go vote for my senator, my Congressional representative, my county exec, and my town council members.
Sure, I understand your position. However, I, and the Supreme Court believe that drug tests, in certain situations (like with high school kids involved in after school activities) don't violate the Constitution. We don't let people with poor eyesight drive, and we require them to submit to eye tests. To me, it's not a unreasonable search to require a kid to pee in a cup (and I don't know many kids who consider their pee their personal property!) to see if he/she's doing drugs - before allowing that kid to potentially endanger others (including my family and friends) on the road. To drive on the road, you should have to prove you're fit. Otherwise, others are endangered.
I honestly don't believe peeing in a cup makes me insecure in my person. My body is not violated in any way, nor endangered, nor injured, nor hurt. My pee is a waste product which we actively work to flush from our homes every day.
It comes down to this, SkyRat. You think testing someone's pee for drugs before getting a drivers license is unreasonable. I do not. The Supreme Court does not. (The Court HAS approved drug tests for kids in extra-curricular activies and in other circumstances. I don't have the cite - but you can easily get information on these cases.) And the voters of North Carolina do not - since they elected Elizabeth Dole.
I don't want kids doing drugs on the road and endangering my family. That IS respect for my rights.
Yes, SkyRat, I do. It will force kids who want drivers licenses to get off of drugs. Even more importantly, it will show kids semi-addicted to drugs that they can get off of them. Evem more importantly, it will show kids that we have certain expectations about right behavior before getting the coveted drivers license. Finally, some deaths and mutilations from car crashes from kids on drugs will be averted. That all sounds good to me.
It comes from people voting democratically for representatives who pass it into law, providing that such in not unconstitutional - just like every other law in this nation. Given that it's not unconsitutional (it isn't, according to the Supreme court), where does a teen have the right not to have a drug screening?
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