House Unit’s Surprise Demand Angers Crime Panel Official : Drug Test Advocate Refuses to Be Tested

An embarrassed member of the President’s Commission on Organized Crime rejected a demand Tuesday that he give a urine sample for a drug test before he could testify about making such tests mandatory for all federal workers.

An unsuspecting Rodney Smith, deputy executive director of the commission, was seated at the witness table of the House Post Office and Civil Service human resources subcommittee when asked to take the test by Chairman Gary L. Ackerman (D-N.Y.) at the outset of the hearing.

Given Specimen Bottle

“The chair will require you to go to the men’s room under the direct observation of a male member of the subcommittee staff to urinate in this specimen bottle,” Ackerman said, as aides placed a three-inch plastic specimen bottle on the witness table before him.

Smith, complaining that he had not been warned that such a test would be required before he testified, called the move “a cheap stunt” and angrily complained later that the subcommittee embarrassed him before television cameras.

Ackerman pointed out that, under the presidential commission’s proposal, federal workers would have no warning either and said that Smith’s protests underscored the subcommittee’s concerns.

The commission, hoping to head off a voracious U.S. demand for illegal drugs, has urged that all private employers also order such tests.

Opponents have challenged the proposal on constitutional grounds and contend the tests often are inaccurate and can falsely label an employee as a drug user.

Ackerman told Smith that his urine would be checked for traces of marijuana, which stays in a person’s urine for up to a month, for cocaine, which stays only a few days, and for amphetamines and barbiturates.

Smith, obviously startled, was silent as commission member Barbara Rowan complained that “these hearings are supposed to be serious matters” and that Congress has no right to demand drug tests “without having probable cause or reasonable suspicion that this test needs to be taken.”

The issue of probable cause “is exactly what this hearing is about,” Ackerman countered. “This is a very serious matter,” with the government considering whether to require millions of federal workers who also may not use drugs to take such tests without reason to believe they are necessary.

Never Mentioned Test

Smith, who later testified without taking the test, told the congressman: “In your letter to me inviting me to come testify about drug testing for federal employees, this (urine test) was not mentioned.”

Ackerman interrupted: “Are there warnings to federal employees as to when their urine will be tested?”

Smith said he would address that issue in his prepared testimony.

“I thank you for very eloquently proving the point that we have set out to prove,” Ackerman said.