[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 89 (Monday, June 25, 2001)]
[House]
[Page H3495]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                      ILLEGAL NARCOTICS IN AMERICA

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Souder) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Speaker, I wanted to raise a couple of things that 
were in yesterday's newspaper that illustrate that as much as we would 
like the drug problem in America to go away, it has not gone away.
  The front page of The New York Times says, ``Violence Rises as Club 
Drug Spreads Out Into the Streets.'' And it is yet another story about 
Ecstasy. On the front page of USA Today just a month ago, ``Ecstasy 
Drug Trade Turns Violent.'' What we see from the charts is that it is 
exploding on the West Coast, it is stabilized on the East Coast, in the 
Midwest it is soaring; and in the south it is roughly stabilized.
  We are seeing more and more kids realize the extreme dangers as more 
and more overdose, as more and more lose ground in their schooling as 
they see side effects like depression, particularly at the so-called 
rave parties which have been featured a lot in New Orleans and other 
places on some national TV shows. Just as crack cocaine became an 
epidemic in America, we are seeing the start of the Ecstasy movement. 
This is partly because of the drug legalization movement in the 
Netherlands and in Europe. We are seeing Ecstasy exported from Belgium 
and the Netherlands into the U.S. It is increasingly becoming the drug 
of choice. We need to be aggressive in our law enforcement, we need to 
be aggressive in our prevention and treatment programs, in our outreach 
programs, as well as our interdiction programs.
  In the Indianapolis Star yesterday, the headline says, ``Drug Test 
Ban Felt at State Schools. Ball State University survey shows rise in 
drug and alcohol use and student discipline since court rejected 
policy.''
  A number of years ago, when I was a staffer for former Senator Dan 
Coats, we allowed drug-free schools money to be used for drug testing 
of student athletes. This policy had been spreading through the United 
States and beyond just the athletic departments to general, random drug 
testing. In my district, at East Noble High School, at Fremont High 
School, we had several model programs developed. In Anderson High 
School, a State court ruled that drug testing the students was illegal 
search and seizure.
  How exactly are we supposed to do prevention programs if the court 
decides it is the legislative body and does not have any legal 
precedent with which to decide that but makes that decision?
  What we do know, and ironically it took a court decision to overturn 
a broad drug testing policy of schools, is in fact that in Indiana drug 
use and alcohol use had gone down, and then when they were ordered to 
stop the program, in 1 year it has gone back up. So the question is, as 
we see the results when a program is pulled back, not whether drug 
testing works, it is how can we do it in a constitutional way, that is 
sensitive to the individual, whether in the workplace, whether at 
school or wherever it be? Because drug testing is one of the most 
effective prevention programs. We have maintained this for years, and 
this new study in Indiana proves it.
  Unless we all work together in prevention, in treatment, in 
interdiction, and in law enforcement, we are going to continue to lose 
many more of our young people and adults to the scourge of illegal 
narcotics.

                          ____________________