DUDE, WHERE'S MY LOAN?

Financial Aid Shouldn't Be Tied to a Student's Drug Record.

COLLEGE KIDS WOULD BE BETTER OFF not taking drugs. They'd also be
better off not drinking when they're underage, not driving drunk at
any age and generally not doing illegal and dangerous things. Most
people (except certain college kids) would agree this makes sense.

But a federal law that singles out drug violations from other kinds of
lawbreaking for special discipline doesn't make any sense. A 1998
amendment to the Higher Education Act denies federal aid to students
with drug convictions. That goes even for misdemeanor cases. But it
doesn't affect those who commit, say, sexual assault, burglary or, for
that matter, murder.

The idea was to discourage drug use, though there's no evidence the
law has had any effect there. What it has done is deny college aid to
almost 200,000 students, more than 30,000 of them in California.
(Proportionately, even more of them are in Indiana. What's that all
about?) Untold numbers of others never apply, undoubtedly knowing they
don't stand a chance.

It is true, as supporters of the amendment say, that college aid is
not an entitlement and that taxpayers have the right not to hand
public favors to scofflaws. But this isn't about lawbreaking; it's
about picking on one form of lawbreaking that appears to be especially
offensive to Rep. Mark Souder (R-Ind.), who wrote the amendment. Drugs
on campus are a problem, no argument there, but underage drinking to
dangerous excess is at least equally pernicious.

The ACLU is going down the wrong path with a lawsuit against the drug
amendment. It claims the law unfairly punishes poor and minority
students, who are more likely to need college aid in the first place.
But almost any restriction on federal funds has a disproportionate
effect on the poor, and minority and needy students are as capable as
anyone else of refraining from drug use.

The stronger argument against the Souder amendment is that it's simply
bad lawmaking -- ineffective at achieving its aims and inconsistent in
its approach. Its only result has been to bar more people from
college, and that doesn't help a nation that needs all the
college-educated young people it can get to compete in the global
marketplace.

As Congress considers the reauthorization of the Higher Education Act,
it should eliminate this amendment, or at least revise it to affect
only students who are convicted of a felony -- any felony. Laws should
be fair and consistent. It doesn't take a college education to see
that.