Alex Barbour

Part 3 Evidence 3
URL: http://www.youthrights.org/research/library/searches-and-seizures-in-public-schools/

Searches and Seizures in Public Schools

The Fourth Amendment to the constitution protects United States citizens from unreasonable
searches and seizures. Our forefathers recognized the harm and abuses that occurred in the
colonies to innocent people by the British, and they made sure to write protections into the U.S.
Constitution. Fearing the police state that any nation has the potential to become and recognizing
that freedom and liberty is meaningless when victimization by the police is a real and foreboding
threat the Fourth Amendment was created. The Fourth Amendment has gone through many
challenges and controversies in the past, and currently the issue of how the Fourth Amendment
applies to students in public schools has come to be contended in the courts. While it is apparent
to me that the Fourth Amendment should be no less applicable in schools than in the general
society these essential Constitutional protections have been under fire in recent years and many
rights have been taken away from students.
The Fourth Amendment of the Constitution states, The right of the people to be secure in their
persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be
violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation,
and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized. No
where in this law does it create special divisions or classifications between adults and minors in
society, so one should naturally assume that persons under 18 should be afforded the same
protections as anyone over 18. The moment when minors are most at the mercy of government
officials is while in school, and this is when these Constitutional Fourth Amendment protections
are needed.
The largest and first assault on the rights of students to be free from unreasonable searches and
seizures occurred in the case of New Jersey v. T.L.O. In 1980 at Piscataway High School in
Middlesex County, N.J. a few girls were caught smoking in the bathroom. After being brought to
the principals office one of the girls, T.L.O., denied that she had been smoking. The principal
then searched her purse looking for cigarettes. After finding a pack of cigarettes the search
continued until the principal discovered evidence of drug dealing. This evidence was used to
prosecute T.L.O. and ultimately she received a year of probation.

Supporting the applicability of the Fourth Amendment in public schools Justice White writing
for the court opinion stated that, It is now beyond dispute that the Federal Constitution, by
virtue of the Fourteenth Amendment, prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures by state
officers. Equally indisputable is the proposition that the Fourteenth Amendment protects the
rights of students against encroachment by public school officials. he further stated that In
carrying out searches and other disciplinary functions pursuant to such policies, school officials
act as representatives of the State, not merely as surrogates for the parents, and they cannot claim
the parents immunity from the strictures of the Fourth Amendment.
While the opinion of the court takes care to point out the rights of students in school and despite
the ruling, tempers it somewhat with its recognition of students rights. The concurring opinion
by Justices OConnor and Powell was not quite as nice. In Powells words I agree with the
Courts decision, and generally with its opinion. I would place greater emphasis, however, on the
special characteristics of elementary and secondary schools that make it unnecessary to afford
students the same constitutional protections granted adults and juveniles in a nonschool setting.
This is clearly a detraction from the rest of the justices opinions and against the nature of the
amendment and previous school precedents.
Ultimately the opinion of the court established a reasonableness approach to search and seizure
rather than a probable cause approach as outlined in the constitution. This Supreme Court
decision reinterpreted how the law applies in school with such wordings as: reasonable grounds
for suspecting that the search will turn up evidence, reasonably related to the objectives of the
search, reasonably related in scope clearly the court has created a new way to apply this law
based on no precedent or prior interpretations. The court has thrown out the probable cause
clause of the Fourth Amendment and invented a murky, dangerous classification of
reasonableness. Clearly this will have the effect of further limiting the rights of students in public
school.
The depreciation of Fourth Amendment protections in school have unfortunately continued
further past the New Jersey v. T.L.O. decision. In the case of Vernonia School District 47J v.
Acton the court approved of random drug testing of athletic students based on no suspicion or
reasonableness at all. Writing for the opinion of the court Justice Scalia says that, A search
unsupported by probable cause can be constitutional, we have said, when special needs, beyond
the normal need for law enforcement, make the warrant and probable-cause requirement

impracticable.' He then goes on to argue that We have found such special needs to exist in the
public-school context. There the warrant requirement would unduly interfere with the
maintenance of the swift and informal disciplinary procedures [that are] needed, and strict
adherence to the requirement that searches be based upon probable cause would undercut the
substantial need of teachers and administrators for freedom to maintain order in the schools.
T.L.O.
In this attack Justice Scalia sets up that the half of the Fourth Amendment that provides for
warrants and probable cause isnt needed in all situations, and then proclaims public schools as a
situation where probable cause and warrants are never needed. Scalia referred back to T.L.O. to
support his claim that schools have special needs but yet goes further than T.L.O. and argues
that not only does the warrant requirement not apply, but the situation of individualized
suspicion of wrong doing that was present with T.L.O. should not apply either. Using Skinner as
precedent Scalia maintains that random, suspicionless searches of students are allowed by the
constitution in public schools.
The circumstances in the Verona School District 47J v. Acton involve a school policy of
requiring random urine tests by athletes for drugs. James Acton, a seventh-grader, wanted to play
football but was not allowed because he would not consent to these random searches. Because of
the broad suspicionless nature of this search it has very negative implications to the Constitution
and to the promise of the Fourth Amendment in public schools and in society at large.
Another important aspect of this case is the courts argument that there is a lower expectation of
privacy in regards to athletics. That due to changing clothes in front of other people on the team
you have some how less of a desire to keep the contents of your veins and arteries a secret. This I
find to be substantially suspect. While I do not argue that the student athletes have a lower
expectation of privacy due to their situation in the locker rooms and activities undertaken
together as a team, I do not believe that this expectation is nearly low enough to allow an
invasion of ones own body for the purposes of a search. Clearly there is no way for anyone to
have any indication of what chemicals are contained inside ones own blood by a casual glance
or even a thorough study of the outside of ones body. The expectation of privacy regarding ones
blood would be equivalent to the contents of a safe hidden and locked inside ones house. While
this expectation of privacy is something to be respected it can still be violated by an individual
suspicious of guilt accompanied by a probable cause and a search warrant. In that case the blood

test or the opening of the safe would be justified in my opinion. But due to the nature of the
randomness of this search it is obvious to me that it is unconstitutional and this court decision
should be reversed.
These two court cases are very important in the evolution of the Fourth Amendment in public
schools.