Opinion ID: 409447
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Fourth Amendment in the Public Schools.

Text: 35 The courts have encountered substantial difficulty in accommodating the fourth amendment to the special situation presented by the public schools, where school officials have both a right and a duty to provide a safe environment conducive to education. At one time, it was not uncommon for a court to view the school official who searched a student as acting under authority derived from the parent and therefore as a private party not subject to the constraints of the fourth amendment. See, e.g., Mercer v. State, 450 S.W.2d 715 (Tex.Civ.App.-Austin 1970); see generally Buss, The Fourth Amendment and Searches of Students in Public Schools, 59 Iowa L.Rev. 739, 765-67 (1974); Comment, Search and Seizure in Public Schools: Are Our Children's Rights Going to the Dogs? 24 St. Louis U.L.J. 119, 127 (1979). As courts in most recent cases have decided, we think it beyond question that the school official, employed and paid by the state and supervising children who are, for the most part, compelled to attend, 16 is an agent of the government and is constrained by the fourth amendment. Accord, Bellnier v. Lund, 438 F.Supp. 47 (N.D.N.Y.1977); State v. Baccino, 282 A.2d 869 (Del.Super.1971); State v. Young, 234 Ga. 488, 216 S.E.2d 586, cert. denied, 423 U.S. 1039, 96 S.Ct. 576, 46 L.Ed.2d 413 (1975); People v. Scott D., 34 N.Y.2d 483, 358 N.Y.S.2d 403, 315 N.E.2d 466 (1974). The Supreme Court's application to school officials of other constitutional restraints applicable only to state action compels that result. See, e.g., Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District, 393 U.S. 503, 89 S.Ct. 733, 21 L.Ed.2d 731 (1969); Goss v. Lopez, 419 U.S. 565, 95 S.Ct. 729, 42 L.Ed.2d 725 (1975); West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette, 319 U.S. 624, 63 S.Ct. 1178, 87 L.Ed. 1628 (1943). 36 But the decision that school officials are governed by the fourth amendment does not dictate a holding that their activity in this case was unconstitutional. The basic concern of the fourth amendment is reasonableness, 17 and reasonableness depends on the circumstances. Often the ordinary requirements of the fourth amendment are modified to deal with special situations. See, e.g., Terry, supra; Marshall v. Barlow's, Inc., 436 U.S. 307, 98 S.Ct. 1816, 56 L.Ed.2d 305 (1978) (administrative search); Camara v. Municipal Court, 387 U.S. 523, 87 S.Ct. 1727, 18 L.Ed.2d 930 (1967) (same); United States v. Skipwith, 482 F.2d 1272 (5th Cir. 1973) (airport search to prevent air piracy); Henderson v. United States, 390 F.2d 805, 808 (9th Cir. 1967) (border search). The public school presents special circumstances that demand similar accommodations of the usual fourth amendment requirements. When society requires large groups of students, too young to be considered capable of mature restraint in their use of illegal substances or dangerous instrumentalities, it assumes a duty to protect them from dangers posed by anti-social activities-their own and those of other students-and to provide them with an environment in which education is possible. To fulfill that duty, teachers and school administrators must have broad supervisory and disciplinary powers. 18 At the same time, though, we must protect the fourth amendment rights of students. Indeed, constitutional rights in the schools take on a special importance. That (the schools) are educating the young for citizenship is reason for scrupulous protection of constitutional freedoms of the individual, if we are not to strangle the free mind at its source and teach youth to discount important principles of our government as mere platitudes. Barnette, supra 319 U.S. at 637, 63 S.Ct. at 1185. 37 When the school official acts in furtherance of his duty to maintain a safe environment conducive to education, 19 the usual accommodation is to require that the school official have reasonable cause for his action. Although the standard is less stringent than that applicable to law enforcement officers, it requires more of the school official than good faith or minimal restraint. The Constitution does not permit good intentions to justify objectively outrageous intrusions on student privacy. 20 See, e.g., Bellnier, supra; M. v. Board of Education, 429 F.Supp. 288, 292 (S.D.Ill.1977); Baccino, supra; Nelson v. State, 319 So.2d 154 (Fla.App.1975). See generally, Terry, supra. Contra, Young, supra. Thus, though we do not question the good faith of the GCISD officials in their attempt to eradicate a serious and menacing drug and alcohol abuse problem, we cannot approve the program on that basis; we must examine its objective reasonableness. 38 At least one case has held that the reasonable cause standard applicable in the schools requires individualized suspicion. Bellnier, supra. There, a teacher had reason to believe that someone in her class of fifth graders had stolen three dollars, but had no reason to suspect any particular pupil. When a search of the coats and coatroom revealed nothing, the teacher and principal required each pupil to remove his shoes and empty his pockets. The two officials then required each student to step into the washroom and strip to his undergarments. The court held the search unconstitutional, requiring the existence of facts giving the official reasonable particularized suspicions as a predicate for a search. Accord, People v. Scott D., 34 N.Y.2d 483, 358 N.Y.S.2d 403, 315 N.E.2d 466 (1974) (dictum). The result in Bellnier is unquestionably correct, and we find its reasoning to be equally applicable to the canine sniffing of children. The intrusion on dignity and personal security that goes with the type of canine inspection of the student's person involved in this case cannot be justified by the need to prevent abuse of drugs and alcohol when there is no individualized suspicion, and we hold it unconstitutional. 39