WHOSE URINE IS IT?

OVER the years, courts have developed a considerable body of jurisprudence
on what may be done with a person's urine, but it is not entirely consistent.

The cases tend to turn on whether people are working in sensitive jobs or
are otherwise at high risk. Bus drivers, railroad employees, police
officers, firefighters, customs agents and many students may be tested even
though there is no particular reason to suspect them of using drugs.
Candidates for high office in Georgia may not.

The latest battleground is parenthood. Last week a federal appeal courts
ruled that expectant parents and people with children may be required to
submit to drug tests to receive welfare benefits in Michigan. The next day,
another federal appeals court held that expectant mothers in South Carolina
may not be tested for drugs to receive medical care.

The United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, which decided the
Michigan case, broke new ground in saying that having children, at least
when receiving public assistance, is a "substantial public safety concern."
The court added that aid recipients could always decline to take the tests,
though they would also have to give up the benefits.

In the South Carolina case, on the other hand, the Court of Appeals for the
Fourth Circuit held that expectant mothers could not be tested because "the
choice to be searched or to forego necessary medical treatment is the
antithesis of free choice."

The two cases differed in one significant way. The South Carolina hospital
was working with the police, and some women were arrested based on the test
results. The Michigan program has no criminal component.

But both cases involved poor people seeking government money. The women in
South Carolina were all insured by Medicaid, and they went to the only
hospital in the area that accepted it.

Graham A. Boyd, one of the lawyers for the Michigan plaintiffs, said the
two courts ultimately disagreed on the price the government may extract
from people for accepting its services. The Sixth Circuit, he said, in
effect ruled that "you can only participate in a program if you agree to be
treated as a second-class citizen."