Hey, everyone, remember that case,the one in Arizona, involving the kid and the Advil, and the principle forcing her to strip and pull aside her undies because another student accused her of having it? Remember how the federal courts eventually put the kibosh on the idea that the practice was kosher because of the violations of privacy? Remember the facepalming about how a local court could right off on it and the relief that the higher courts would actually listen to common sense about the idea of strip searching a kid for over the counter headache medicine? Hahahaha...those were the times, right?
....yeah, time to stop laughing, since apparently, the Supreme Court seems to be leaning toward the idea that it's the only SENSIBLE thing to do in schools. Via the New York Times (and with thanks to John Cole for the linkage this morning)
The United States Supreme Court spent an hour on Tuesday debating what middle school students are apt to put in their underwear and what should be done about it.
Justice Stephen G. Breyer, for instance, said it struck him as "a logical thing" that adolescents seeking to hide pills "will stick them in their underwear."
That's right. It's only sensible that if a kid wants to hide pills or drugs, the LOGICAL place would be to instantly hide them in their drawers. Which apparently makes it ok. Breyer actually ended up using an anecdote about his childhood where people used to stick stuff in his underwear while changing.
Ok...maybe I'm being a bit alarmist. Maybe he's just trying to get all the angles, right? Just make sure all the arguments are rigorous and all, right?....unfortunately, the rest of the commentary by the court seems to go down the same line of 'What's the big ****ing deal?!'
Courtesy of Chief Justice Roberts:
[...] Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. suggested that the law might treat different undergarments differently. "The issue here covers the brassiere as well," he said, "which doesn’t seem as outlandish as the underpants."
Yeah, making them take off their bra in front of the principle is so much more sensible.
Scalia:
"You search in the student’s pack, you search the student’s outer garments, and you have a reasonable suspicion that the student has drugs," he said. "Don’t you have, after conducting all these other searches, a reasonable suspicion that she has drugs in her underpants?"
"You’ve searched everywhere else," Justice Scalia said. "By God, the drugs must be in her underpants."
Or...you know...they could just not have it. Maybe it's an administrator's duty to actually confirm and reaffirm things before going that far, rather than taking it on the word of one other student hoping to get out of trouble for being caught red handed herself.
EDIT: Pointed out by Ken in Tex and added at the suggestion of justmy2, from the LA Times article on it, which better frames the overall skepticism of the court against Redding's case:
"What about a "body cavity search?" asked Justice Antonin Scalia.
Wright replied that no school official would undertake such a search, but he insisted it would be legal.
Isn't that nice? The only thing between a cavity search in schools and the children is 'reasonable school officials'. Not exactly comforting ni my view.
Souter:
"My thought process," Justice Souter said, "is I would rather have the kid embarrassed by a strip search, if we can’t find anything short of that, than to have some other kids dead because the stuff is distributed at lunchtime and things go awry."
Safety trumps privacy and dignity! If it protects the kids from the evil of Aleve and Motrin, then we have no choice but to strip them naked until we find those damn pills!!!
.....
So....yeah. I....I really don't know what to say here. I HOPE that the rest of the Justices aren't quite so tonedeaf-sounding. But with Thomas and Alito yet to weigh in so much it seems, I don't know.
Maybe the others are just waiting for the argument from the state as to why they're absolutely necessary. I really hope so. I really hope this is just a matter of being rigorous about the arguments that come their way.
Sadly....with the Roberts Supreme Court?....my first instinct has been to hope for the 2nd best and anticipate the absolute worst.
EDIT: Small bit giving credit to John Cole, from whom I found the article from.
EDIT 2: Added a somewhat disturbing observation from the LA Times article, pointed out by Ken in Tex, and added as suggested by justmy2.