Internet Disagree. Then, a Response Bill Clinton,

¶ … Internet disagree. Then, a response

Bill Clinton, it was, who once said that he smoked marijuana, but he didn't inhale. This famous assertion was made during his presidency of the United States, and helps to marginalize the effect of certain recreational drugs. If a person can become president of a country as powerful as the U.S. And smoke a little marijuana, then it should be noted that all illegal drugs are not as bad as others. This distinction between illegal drugs is of particular importance in the debate to test welfare users for drugs in certain states, where the penalty can have significant impacts upon the user's family, including the cutting of state funds for up to three years. When one pauses to consider the damage done to a person's family by curtailing their state funding for three years, it becomes clear that there should not be drug testing for welfare recipients because it would be costly to enforce, violate Constitutional rights, and make matters substantially worse for those who depend on the funding.

The proposed measure of testing welfare recipients for drugs has the potential to cost more than any potential benefit might bring about. To accurately test for drug use, certain occupations mandate potential employees to submit a strand of hair or a urine sample to be analyzed via laboratories. This method yields the most irrefutable proof for the usage of drugs, and would be highly expensive to carry out for each and every recipient of welfare on a state or even national level, as the following quotation from an editorial in The Washington Times sufficiently demonstrates. "…opponents of these measures cite the expense of drug testing." The measures referred to are the state proposals for drug testing of welfare recipients; the expenses alluded to are for infallible measures of drug use such as the aforementioned lab work. Any other measures used to determine drug use, such as the editorial's insinuation that a survey can be used) would more than likely result in recipients lying and still be costly to fund and supply.

Other additional methods for determining whether welfare recipients are using illegal drugs can potentially violate constitutional rights, as was the case when such a law was proposed in Michigan in 1999 -- before it was then overturned as it was deemed unconstitutional. The following quotation demonstrates that any sort of monitoring, or searching of drug paraphernalia on welfare recipients goes against the Fourth Amendment. "U.S. District Judge Victoria Roberts cited potential issues regarding the Fourth Amendment's guarantee against unreasonable search and seizure, and the Sixth Circuit Court upheld the ban." The ban referred to in this quotation was the ban against drug testing for welfare recipients, which was outlawed in Michigan due to violation of the Fourth Amendment, proving future drug testing could incur similar violations.