Pro's/Con's of Random Drug Testing Term Paper

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checkyourassignments.org/images/spacer.gif exposure due to liability apart from increased premiums of employees compensation. Employers possess a http://www.checkyourassignments.org/images/spacer.gif self-interest while maintaining a workplace which http://www.checkyourassignments.org/images/spacer.gif free from drugs meant for the security as well as interests of staffs and bosses alike. But this is far from the complete picture. Debate comes to the fray when bosses either inexpertly or through force enforce drug testing in a way which infringes individual or privileges granted by the constitution like 'Right to Privacy' or the safeguard from illegal investigations as well as arrests. Although almost all states allow employee testing of drugs, nevertheless no state mandate http://www.checkyourassignments.org/images/spacer.gif

In case of particular bosses who execute testing programs of drugs, it is vital that the http://www.checkyourassignments.org/images/spacer.gif adhere to procedure stipulated under the state and federal laws so as to guarantee protection of employee rights and privileges. ("Drug Testing," n. d.)

Coming to the constitutional provisions, the U.S. Constitution does not ban employee drug testing. But in the 1989 Treasury Employees v. Von Raab, 489 U.S., 656 of the U.S. Supreme Court case, the verdict announced by the High Court was that staffs are required to show urine specimen that comprised an investigation under the purview of the U.S. Constitution's Fourth Amendment. Thus, every test of that nature must comply with the justification necessities of the Fourth Amendment that safeguards the countrymen against "unjustified" investigations as well as arrests. Besides, the Court too gave a ruling that tests which are positive cannot hold good in forthcoming prosecutions of criminal nature in the absence of employee's consent. One more constitutional http://www.checkyourassignments.org/images/spacer.gif of drug testing of employees entails the Fifth Amendment which is applicable to the states by the Fourth Amendment that bans life denial, freedom or assets in the absence of permissible legal procedure. ("Drug Testing," n. d.)

As the bulk of the private-sector employees in the U.S. leaving http://www.checkyourassignments.org/images/spacer.gif employees under the union regarded as employees who work under will, a boss is not liable to express a cause for job dismissal. but, under certain conditions, the rejection job, or the rejection of ongoing employment dependent on drug tests might call upon "due process" issues, like the staying in force of the results of the test, the rights of the staff to react, or any necessary note to a staff. Eventually, identical terms under the Constitutions, persons possess a basic right to self-privacy as also his assets. Testing of drugs might come under the ambit of constitutional challenge in case testing outcomes are revealed in an arbitrary manner, in case the methods for obtaining the personal specimens fail to honor the right to privacy of the individual http://www.checkyourassignments.org/images/spacer.gif or in case the experiment is needlessly or greatly forced upon. ("Drug Testing," n. d.)

Random drug tests do not constitute a surefire measurement of job performance. Rather, random drug testing policies on employees wrongly allow bosses to embark on eavesdropping private, outside the job personal performances and practices of employees which are beyond the scope of employers' business. It is been rightly pointed out that employees should be evaluated by the quality of their work, and never by the quality of their urine. If the federal data are any indication, just a small portion of the American working population ever consumes an illegal substance and even fewer consume any illegal drug. but, random workplace drug testing program consider every employees responsible for unlawful activity till the moment their urine report says on the contrary. On this accord, random employee drug testing is considered as a degrading, persistent practice that functions against the long-term American ideals of due process and assumption of innocence. (Armentano, n. d.)

Through the practice of random drug testing, it employees are forced to submit proof against themselves and surrender their privacy rights as an essential requirement for employment. Instead of considering their workers guiltless of illegal activity as statistically, the vast majority are the execution of employee drug testing assumes the whole employee strength accountable till the moment they prove to the contrary. According to the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, the preventive outcomes of drug testing have at no point of time been proved. There have been no convincing scientific proof from suitably controlled researches that random drug testing program in workplaces extensively do not encourage drug use. Moreover, it has been conjectured by many that doubtless drug testing programs might, in reality be damaging to the occupational setting as they build an environment of lack of trust between employee and employers, and in some instances, might result in overuse of hard drug by urging workers to changeover from the consumption of marijuana which can be detected to a comparatively longer period following use, to drugs that are excreted from the body rather speedily, like cocaine and heroin.

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(Armentano, n. d.)

In the eyes of law, even if employers may posses the right to put job applicants to drug testing, the law curbs employers' right to test their present employees for the presence of drugs. Above all, drug testing is not a necessity under the Drug-Free Workplace Act of 1988. The bulk of the employers throughout the United States are not needed to test and a lot of state and local governments have laws in place that restrict or ban workplace testing. Nevertheless, random drug testing is allowed in certain industries, inclusive of the transportation industry. Likewise, employees working in safety or security environments such as refineries, nuclear power plants might be put to random testing. In case, an employee state has laws in place that protects the right to privacy, the individual might refuse drug testing. ("Employee Privacy Right-Drug Testing," n. d.)

It is a fact that those who do not consume drugs have nothing to hide, their objection to random drug testing is legitimate because people who are innocent still posses something- which is their own life. The privilege to be left alone happens to the most wide-ranging of rights and the http://www.checkyourassignments.org/images/spacer.gif that is most valued by civilized people. Things are unjust to compel employees who do not come under the scanner of drug use to substantiate their purity through a degrading an unsure methodology that infringes privacy of individuals. It is a fact that examination of a person's urine can reveal a lot of details regarding the individual's private life aside to drug use. Historically, Americans have regarded that normal searches of people who are innocent stand to be unjust. ("Drug testing in the workplace," n. d.)

Hence these long-term ideals of fairness must be made applicable to private sector, although the Fourth Amendment exclusively applies to government initiatives. Random drug tests through testing of presence of drugs in urine are investigations of the physical body which constitute an unparalleled incursion on the infringement of the right to privacy. The normal procedure in giving these types of tests need personnel to collect urine in the attendance of a witness so as keep a close watch against tampering of the specimen. According to a judge which although considerately guarded can be http://www.checkyourassignments.org/images/spacer.gif

It was the observation of a federal judge when he nullified a program of drug testing meant for fire-brigade belonging to the municipality that testing for the presence of drugs is a type of scrutiny, although of a technical nature. ("Drug testing in the workplace," n. d.) lot of states restrict an employer's privilege to undertake random testing either by law or by judicial verdict. For instance Rhode Island and Vermont bans random testing totally, and California, Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, Puerto Rico, and West Virginia prohibit random testing to some extent, normally to personnel in safety or positions where there are security-sensitive. Truly, the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts has gave the verdict that random drug testing program of a company was void as it failed to discriminate between employees who held post of safety and the ones who did not. A staff cannot, nevertheless, carry out random drug testing in a manner that intervenes with the rights of employees under Section 8(a) (3) or 8(a)(1) of the National Labor Relations Act. (Ford; Notestine; Hill, 2000).....

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