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Skinner v. Railway Labor Executives' Association

Supreme Court of the United States · 1989 · Criminal Procedure

Criminal ProcedureFourth AmendmentAdministrative SearchesDrug TestingFourth Amendmentsearchblood testurine test

Facts

The Federal Railroad Administration, acting under the Federal Railroad Safety Act, promulgated regulations addressing alcohol and drug use by railroad employees engaged in safety-sensitive duties. Subpart C required railroads to obtain blood and urine samples from covered employees directly involved in certain major train accidents, impact accidents, and incidents involving an on-duty employee fatality. Subpart D authorized, but did not compel, railroads to require breath or urine testing in specified circumstances such as reasonable suspicion of impairment, certain reportable accidents, and specified safety-rule violations. The FRA adopted these regulations after finding that alcohol and drug use by railroad employees had contributed to serious accidents, fatalities, injuries, and property damage, and that observation-based enforcement had detected only a small number of violations.

Issue

Whether FRA regulations mandating or authorizing blood, urine, and breath testing of railroad employees involved in specified accidents or safety violations violate the Fourth Amendment. The Court also had to decide whether tests conducted by private railroads under the permissive Subpart D constituted governmental action and whether the testing procedures were searches.

Rule

Collection and chemical analysis of blood, breath, and urine for alcohol or drug testing are Fourth Amendment searches. In contexts involving special needs beyond normal law enforcement, a search may be reasonable without a warrant or individualized suspicion when the government's compelling interests would be jeopardized by those requirements and the privacy interests implicated are limited in light of the circumstances, including diminished expectations of privacy and narrowly regulated discretion.

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One of 10 multiple-choice questions for this case. Pick an answer to see why.

A federal transit-safety agency issues a rule allowing private subway operators in Chicago and Cleveland to require saliva and urine tests after specified signal violations. The rule preempts contrary state law, forbids employers from bargaining away the testing authority, requires removal from duty for employees who refuse, and gives the agency access to samples and test results, but it does not literally compel any operator to test.

If a subway operator orders a test under that rule, is the Fourth Amendment most likely implicated?

Explanation. The majority held that private testing can become governmental action when the government does more than passively permit it. Relevant indicators include preemption of contrary law, access to results, inability to bargain away the authority, and mandatory removal for refusal. Those features make the test sufficiently attributable to the government, even without a direct command to test. (Derived from Skinner v. Railway Labor Executives' Association (n.d.).)